Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

GLASGOW CORPORATION ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL

Consideration deferred till Monday next.

PETITIONS

Angola

Mr. Dan Jones: Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a Petition on behalf of the citizens of my constituency of Burnley, and I would add that I consider it a privilege to do so. I assure the House that it is completely spontaneous and comes mainly from the congregations of the churches and chapels in the constituency of Burnley.
The Petition showeth
that the native population of the country of Angola is suffering death and injury at the hands of the Government of Portugal. Wherefore your Petitioners pray that Her Majesty's Government will seek to dissuade the Government of Portugal from military aggression against the native population of the country of Angola.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

To lie upon the Table.

Mr. Pavitt: With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I beg leave to present a Petition on behalf of 700 of my constituents, led by the Free Church Council, which showeth that
Your Petitioners view with great concern the continuing harsh and repressive policy of the Government of the Republic of Portugal towards many of its subjects in its African territory of Angola.
Further, they pray that your honourable House should manifest its disapproval of such policy by same signal act.
Your Petitioners therefore humbly pray that no military supplies should be allowed to be sent from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Republic of

Portugal, its overseas territories in Africa and elsewhere, while such repressive policy is continued, or that such measures may be taken as your honourable House shall deem.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

To lie upon the Table.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNITED NATIONS (WORKING GROUP)

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the Lord Privy Seal what information has been supplied by Her Majesty's Government to the 15-member Working Group appointed by the United Nations on principles to be applied in determining a special scale of assessments for peace and security, further to the General Assembly's resolution on the question of covering the costs of the United Nations peace-keeping operations.

The Minister of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. J. B. Godber): We have already made clear in the General Assembly our dislike of a special scale of assessment. The United Kingdom is a member of the Working Group and our representative has been instructed to reiterate this view.

Mr. Thomson: is the Minister not aware that the Government were asked to give information on the principles which they wished to see applied by 1st July? Is the hon. Gentleman saying that no such information has been provided? In view of the difficulties of running the Congo operation on an ad hoc basis, will the British Government not press, in line with the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' disarmament proposals, for the setting up of a permanent United Nations peace force financed on a permanent basis by the members of the United Nations?

Mr. Godber: That supplementary question goes a little wide of the original Question. As to the first part, the fact that we are members of this group means that our views will be adequately put forward. But I ought to make it plain that we object to a special scale because we believe that the capacity of members to pay is adequately reflected in the regular scale of assessments. If people only paid their regular assessments there would be no difficulty.

African and Colonial Issues

Mr. Brockway: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will make a statement about the changed instructions that have been given to United Kingdom delegates to the United Nations regarding the action to be taken when resolutions relating to African and colonial issues are under consideration.

Mr. Godber: I assume the hon. Gentleman is referring to the statement made by my noble Friend in another place on 26th June. As my noble Friend made clear, Her Majesty's Representative in the United Nations is being instructed to ignore any reference to General Assembly Resolution 1514 (XV) whenever this is referred to in a preambular clause of a draft resolution, and on every occasion to make clear that he does so. The United Kingdom vote will then be directed to the substance of the matter.

Mr. Brockway: This is a very welcome and important statement. Does it mean that in future we shall not be placed in the humiliating position of being in a minority of two or three with the French and Portuguese on issues like Angola, South Africa, South-West Africa, Algeria and the Congo, and that we shall begin to vote according to the principles of democracy and liberty?

Mr. Godber: It is quite clear as to what this will mean. It will affect our voting on some of those issues, but we are not afraid of being in a minority when we believe that we are right.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMANY

Deconcentration of Industry

Mr. Hale: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will now make a statement on progress made with deconcentration of German industry required by Allied High Commission Law No. 27, as announced to the House on 4th March, 1953.

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Edward Heath): The Allied deconcentration measures have been carried through to completion, in accordance with the Bonn Settlement Convention, except for the disposal under the Krupp Deconcentration Plan of the coal and steel assets incorporated in the Rheinhausen company.

Mr. Hale: While thanking the right hon. Gentleman for not seeking to answer Questions Nos. 3 and 4 together, may I ask him why six weeks ago the House of Lords was given the full figures when the noble Marquess in another place said that £100 million of Krupp assets had not been disposed of and that the Krupp turnover was now £452 million a year? Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that those of us who hold a favourable view towards the Common Market will be affected by the fact that this notorious war criminal is likely to dominate our steel industry? Was the right hon. Gentleman unaware of this statement in another place five or six weeks ago? Otherwise why did he not mention it to the House of Commons today?

Mr. Heath: If the hon. Gentleman will look at my Answer in the OFFICIAL REPORT he will see that there is exactly the situation I have described. The hon. Gentleman asked for a progress report. The scheme has been carried through, as I said, except for the disposal of the Krupp assets incorporated in the Rheinhausen company. If the hon. Gentleman wants the full and detailed figures I will give them to him if he will put down another question.

Mr. Hale: Does the Lord Privy Seal not remember an undertaking that was given to this House in 1953 by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer that he had now embodied this agreement in the Bonn Convention Agreement No. 17. Chancellor Adenauer agreed that it would be enforced, but that it might take a year or two to enforce, but now, when the Lord Privy Seal says "with the exception of", is it not the fact that the Krupp assets were estimated at £112 million and that the amount he says he has accepted is £100 million—or about 90 per cent. of the amount for which they were going to be disposed of in 1953?

Mr. Heath: Other assets were disposed of under that plan, but the situation remains as the hon. Gentleman described. In fact, of course, the Mixed Committee of Experts was given the reponsibility of looking at this progress over the years, and it recommended another extension until 31st January, 1962. It could not have done that under


its terms of reference unless there had been evidence that a genuine attempt had been made to sell the assets and than it had not proved possible to do so.

Berlin

Mr. Rankin: asked the Lord Privy Seal what reply he proposes making to the Soviet proposal that West Berlin should become a demilitarised free city with its neutrality guaranteed by British, Russian, United States and French troops.

Mr. Heath: Her Majesty's Government have received no proposals from the Soviet Government.

Mr. Rankin: Is the right hon. Gentleman then not aware that on 15th June of this year Mr. Khrushchev agreed that he was in favour of a free city of West Berlin? Is the right hon. Gentleman also not aware that his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said from that Box that he, too, is in favour of the freedom of West Berlin? Could the Lord Privy Seal tell me how these freedoms are going to be advanced if we arm West Germany with nuclear weapons?

Mr. Heath: These are two unrelated questions. The hon. Gentleman has often had the answer about the arming of Germany, within the N.A.T.O. framework, with the nuclear warheads under American control. As far as the first part of the Question is concerned, that is surely a question of how one is to protect that freedom.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Lord Privy Seal why he cannot give an undertaking that Her Majesty's Government will never again agree to the bombing of Berlin.

Mr. Heath: A unilateral undertaking by Her Majesty's Government would not serve any useful purpose.

Mr. Hughes: If the Government are so concerned about the future of Berlin, why cannot the right hon. Gentleman give a definite assurance to the 3 million people in West Berlin that we will not bomb them?

Mr. Heath: The 2½ million people of West Berlin have their anxieties. They know who is responsible for heighten-

ing tension over Berlin. It is not the Western Powers.

Mr. Hughes: In that case, will the Government approach Mr. Khrushchev to see whether they can get a joint declaration that Berlin will not be bombed, in the same way as Paris and Rome were not bombed in the last war?

Mr. Heath: Such a joint declaration is not necessary if Mr. Khrushchev does not make a crisis over Berlin.

Oral Answers to Questions — N.A.T.O.

Mr. Zilliacus: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether it is still the Government's policy, as laid down in the 1959 and previous proposals, that a united Germany should be free to enter the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

Mr. Heath: It is the policy of Her Majesty's Government that Germany should be reunited on the basis of self-determination and become an independent sovereign state, free to join any defensive security pact or none if it so wished.

Mr. Zilliacus: On the basis of principle, if Germany is to have full self-determination and sovereignty, does that include the right to provide herself with any arms she wishes, in any quantity? If not, why grant her freedom to join a military alliance, which is another way of preparing for war? On the point of policy, is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that this condition has imposed an insuperable barrier to any German settlement for years and that, by clinging to the condition, the Government have laid themselves open to the suspicion that they do not really want any German settlement?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir. The N.A.T.O. alliance, if that is what the hon. Member refers to, is a defensive alliance. The conditions regarding German arms are clearly laid down in the Western European Union Treaty.

Mr. Rankin: Does the reunification of Germany include the return of Silesia?

Mr. Heath: As has been repeatedly said in the House, the whole question of the exact frontier settlement must depend upon a peace conference.

British Property (Claims)

Mr. Stratton Mills: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether, pending a German peace treaty, he will collect details of the claims of British citizens whose property, situate in Germany, was lost as a result of the war of 1939–45.

Mr. Godber: No, Sir. I do not think that in existing circumstances this would serve any useful purpose.

Mr. Mills: Does not my hon. Friend feel that when a German peace treaty is negotiated eventually one may find oneself in considerable difficulty in formulating these claims owing to the passage of time? Does not he feel that this would be a good opportunity to collect a comprehensive register of these claims which could be put forward in any German peace treaty negotiations?

Mr. Godber: I do not think that we could do that. This is normally done under a peace treaty by the submission of claims by the claimants direct to the dependent Government. Therefore, prior registration with us would probably not be accepted. Certain particulars of British property in Germany were registered at the Board of Trade during and after the war, although they did not include details of claims.

Foreign Ministers (Conference)

Mr. Mendelson: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether Her Majesty's Government are now prepared to take a new initiative and propose a conference of Foreign Ministers of the United Kingdom, France, the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to discuss all aspects of the German problem.

Mr. Heath: We are in the closest consultation with our allies on the many aspects of this question. When we act we shall act in concert with them.

Mr. Mendelson: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that it would be sensible to start serious negotiations at a fairly high level before the momentum of military preparations on all sides becomes an element in making a successful outcome of these negotiations all the more difficult?

Mr. Heath: As we have made plain on a number of occasions in the House, and after the breakdown of the Summit Conference last year, the Western Powers are prepared for negotiation, but not under threat.

Oral Answers to Questions — ANGOLA

Mr. Hale: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will make representations to the Portuguese Government in view of the fact that it is not complying with Article 10 of the Anglo-Portuguese Convention of 1891, which guarantees full protection for missionaries in British and Portuguese territories in Africa.

Mr. Heath: I shall, of course, be ready to consider this if the missionary bodies who are those principally concerned bring forward facts which justify such representations.

Mr. Hale: Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting to the House that he is in any doubt at all that there is no freedom of religion and religious speech in Angola? After the miserable collaboration of the Tory Party with the Portuguese Government and the I.L.O. in the breaches of those terms in 1930 and after the miserable collaboration of the Tory Government over the United Nations resolution seeking to abolish forced labour in Angola in 1957, is the right hon. Gentleman really now suggesting that the Foreign Office, all of them, several thousands of them, are unaware that missionaries have been murdered in Angola and are unaware that there is no freedom of religious expression? Has the right hon. Gentleman not read the speeches of Dr. Salazar that were made 15 years ago?

Sir H. Studholme: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As we have a debate this afternoon on the question of Angola, is not that the moment for the hon. Gentleman to put forward all these points?

Mr. Speaker: The real point about it is that rather too often I have to appeal to hon. Members not to make speeches at Question Time because we do not get through enough Questions. Perhaps the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) will get near to bringing his question to an end.

Mr. Hale: I appreciate your courtesy, Mr. Speaker. One does not often speak on the grave of 50,000 citizens.

Mr. Speaker: If questions were to be increased in length proportionate to their importance and gravity, it would be difficult for me to judge the element of inordinate length.

Mr. Hale: Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that he does not or did not know?

Mr. Heath: I understand that in central and South Angola British Baptist missionaries are carrying on their work without difficulty. That is the information that we have. As far as Northern Angola is concerned, where the troubles are at the moment, the Baptist missions have been closed in certain places, in one where the whole Portuguese administration has been withdrawn and is, therefore, unable to protect them, and in another where they have been withdrawn for security reasons. I propose to deal with this matter later on in the debate.

Mr. Brockway: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will make a statement on the decision of Her Majesty's Government to send the United Kingdom Consul-General and another official of the Lisbon Embassy on a visit of inquiry to Angola.

Mr. Driberg: asked the Lord Privy Seal what reports on the situation in Angola have now been received from the Consul-General in Luanda and another member of Her Majesty's Embassy in Lisbon.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the Lord Privy Seal what report he has received from the Consul-General in Luanda, Angola, following his visit to the northern part of that territory; and what changes in the policy of Her Majesty's Government are proposed in the light of that report.

Mr. Heath: Her Majesty's Consul-General at Luanda will be accompanied on his visit by the Military and Air Attaches to Her Majesty's Embassy at Lisbon, who left for Luanda on 3rd July. It is expected the visit to Northern Angola will begin shortly.

Mr. Brockway: Will the Lord Privy Seal give our representatives instructions

that whilst they are in North Angola they will meet the few English missionaries who remain there, and the few African pastors; and will he instruct them to proceed to the Congo to meet the representatives of the 100,000 refugees who are there?

Mr. Heath: As to the latter part of the hon. Gentleman's question, our representatives in the Congo are already able to meet the refugees who are now in that country. I am certain that the Consul-General and the Attaches who are to go to Northern Angola will take every opportunity to meet those on the spot and judge the position for themselves.

Mr. Driberg: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that one of the important things about a mission of this kind, investigating this kind of allegation, is that it should take place very quickly, because the material evidence tends to vanish? Is he aware that it is now about ten days since his noble Friend made this announcement in the House of Lords? Since he himself told us that the Consul-General was in Luanda all the time, could they not have gone there a bit sooner?

Mr. Heath: We are anxious that they should go there as soon as possible, but as part of the issue in debate is the military conditions and situation there we thought it advisable that the Consul-General should go accompanied by the Military Attaché. As the Air Attaché has a fluent knowledge of Portuguese, we thought that too would be an asset.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: Has not the right hon. Gentleman been aware for some time that there was to be a debate in this House on the Angola situation, and could not he have pressed that the Consul-General should himself, if necessary, have gone to the Northern Territory in order that the right hon. Gentleman might, during the debate later this evening, give the House a report of what was found? Will he give an assurance that when the report comes through he will consider publishing it as a White Paper?

Mr. Heath: The necessary arrangements have to be made, and they are not entirely in our own hands. As to publishing the report, it is not, of course, the practice to publish diplomatic reports


of this kind, but I will certainly give all the information I can to the House at the earliest opportunity after we have received the report.

Mr. Healey: Did Her Majesty's Government previously ask permission for our Consul-General in Luanda to be allowed to visit the area where fighting was going on in Angola in the middle of March? Secondly, can the right hon. Gentleman say whether he has instructed the mission making the visit to inquire whether British arms are being used by the Portuguese Government in their repression of the native population?

Mr. Heath: We have not previously asked formal permission to go to the Northern Territory. In regard to the latter part of the hon. Gentleman's Question, our representatives can certainly look into that.

Mr. Swingler: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he has considered the petitions forwarded to him by the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme on 27th June calling for action within the United Nations by Her Majesty's Government in relation to Portuguese punitive measures in Angola and to bring about peace in the area; and what reply he has made.

Mr. Heath: I have already sent a reply to the hon. Gentleman, which he should by now have received.

Mr. Swingler: Will the right hon. Gentleman say on what occasions and in what form he has conveyed to the Portuguese Government the very strong protests received from citizens in this country, especially from members of the church communities, about the atrocities and outrages in Angola? Is the Lord Privy Seal aware of the very strong opposition there is throughout the country to any continued supply of arms to a Government responsible for these outrages?

Mr. Heath: The Portuguese Government is well aware of the strong feelings we have in this country, and of the petitions presented to individual Members of Parliament—and to this House, as we have seen this afternoon. In addition, my noble Friend had a very full opportunity to discuss this matter with the Portuguese Government during his recent visit to Lisbon.

Mr. Healey: asked the Lord Privy Seal what information he has received regarding the activities of the United Nations Sub-Committee of Inquiry on Angola.

Mr. Hannan: asked the Lord Privy Seal what recent representations he has made to facilitate the work of the United Nations Committee of Inquiry into the situation in Angola following the decisions of the United Nations General Assembly and the Security Council.

Mr. V. Yates: asked the Lord Privy Seal what information has been brought to the attention of the United Nations sub-committee on Angola regarding the execution of Africans in the village of Tomboco and other places, and regarding the machine gunning of children from aeroplanes in that country; and what progress has been made by the subcommittee in their study of conditions in Angola.

Mr. Heath: I understand that the Sub-Committee is meeting at present in New York, and that the Portuguese Government is in touch with Senor Salamanca, who is its Chairman. Its proceeding are confidential, and I am unable to say what information may have been brought to its attention. Its latest progress report is in United Nations Press Release GA/2221, a copy of which is in the Library of the House. We hope that the Sub-Committee will report as soon as possible.

Mr. Healey: Can the Lord Privy Seal say whether the Sub-Committee has yet requested permission to enter Angola to pursue inquiries and, if so, what has been the response of the Portuguese Government to this request?

Mr. Heath: As I have said, the Sub-Committee is in touch with the Portuguese Government, but we do not know what decision has been reached.

Mr. Hannan: In the event of Portugal refusing such permission, will the Lord Privy Seal consider allowing the Sub-Committee entry to Northern Rhodesia in order to pursue its inquiries?

Mr. Heath: We hope that that eventuality will not arise. We have expressed publicly the hope that the Portuguese Government will co-operate with the Sub-Committee. In regard to the latter part


of the hon. Gentleman's question, this is not a matter that the Sub-Committee wishes to discuss with individuals. It wishes to go to Angola itself.

Mr. P. Noel-Baker: Will the right hon. Gentlernan supply to the Sub-Committee the evidence of the British missionaries and British journalists who have been in Angola?

Mr. Heath: I think that the right hon. Gentleman raised this question last week, and I understand now that the Sub-Committee has been in direct touch with British Baptist missionaries who have come back from Angola about any evidence they can give to it.

Mr. Hannan: asked the Lord Privy Seal what contribution has been made or offered to the United Nations by Her Majesty's Government for the relief of refugees from Angola.

Mr. Godber: None, Sir. The United Nations authorities have not asked for contributions for the relief of refugees from Angola. However, as I told the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Bromwich (Mr. Dugdale) in reply to a Question on 28th June, the United Nations authorities are using supplies provided by the Congo Famine Relief Fund for relief work amongst Angolan refugees in the Congo. They consider that their present stocks of food are adequate for this purpose.

Mr. Hannan: If the Government will not do something positive about this matter through the United Nations, will not they go a little further on humanitarian grounds alone? Will the Government consider the fact that there are 100,000 Angolan refugees in the Congo now? Would not it be appropriate for the Government to make some contribution to the International Red Cross in order to deal with this human problem?

Mr. Godber: I have looked into this matter most carefully. The fact remains that the United Nations famine relief organisation is doing an extremely good job. It has adequate supplies. The Red Cross is also very well provided for, and I should like to pay tribute, as I am sure the whole House would, to the remarkable job which it has done with regard to this very large number of refugees. There is no call at present for additional

funds. If any came, naturally the Government would consider it sympathetically.

Mr. Hannan: Does not the Minister of State recognise that the greatest contribution which the Government can make to this repression by the Portuguese Government is to make a forthright declaration against the atrocities which are taking place?

Mr. Godber: I think that that is outside this Question.

Mr. Speaker: It is quite outside the Question.

Oral Answers to Questions — BULGARIA (CLAIMS)

Mr. E. Johnson: asked the Lord Privy Seal what progress is being made towards the settlement of claims made by British subjects against the Bulgarian Government through the Foreign Compensation Commission.

Mr. Godber: One hundred and thirty-eight applications have been received by the Foreign Compensation Commission under the Foreign Compensation (Bulgaria) Order, 1958; the Commission has finally determined ninety-eight of these and expects to have disposed of the remainder by the end of July, with a view to making an interim payment shortly afterwards.

Mr. Johnson: While welcoming that news, is my right hon. Friend aware that some of these people have been waiting for over ten years and that one gentleman, about whom I have already written to his Department, was for four years in a Nazi internment camp and is 79 years of age? As his claim has been provisionally accepted by the Foreign Compensation Commission and estimated at being over £12,000, will my right hon. Friend at least make sure that these people are able to get something before they die?

Mr. Godber: I realise that there has been a delay, but it has been a complicated matter. I am hopeful, as I say, that the Foreign Compensation Commission will be in a position to make some payment shortly, and I hope that that will help my hon. Friend's constituent.

Oral Answers to Questions — EUROPEAN ECONOMIC COMMUNITY

Mr. Pentland: asked the Lord Privy Seal what conditions have been proposed to Her Majesty's Government by the West German Federal Republic, on behalf of the Common Market countries, under which Her Majesty's Government could gain entry into the European Economic Community.

Mr. Heath: None, Sir.

Mr. Pentland: Why is the Lord Privy Seal so cagey about this? Is it not the fact that the Foreign Minister of the German Federal Republic has made it quite clear in London, on behalf of the Common Market countries, that before Britain would be allowed to negotiate a special settlement she must sign the Rome Treaty, with all its political consequences? Would he not now therefore tell the House the true nature of the special settlement we wish to negotiate, and in what way he would define the political consequences in the event of this country becoming a full member of the European Economic Community?

Mr. Heath: There was some complaint from hon. Members opposite when I devoted forty minutes of my speech in the recent foreign affairs debate to the situation in relation to the Common Market and the Treaty of Rome, and I do not need to go through that again now. These talks have been carried out between officials and Ministers. They have been bilateral talks, not on behalf either of the European Economic Community or of E.F.T.A. They have been exploratory discussions of a confidential nature, and I do not think that it would be appropriate for me to divulge what took place in them.

Mr. Shinwell: But cannot the right hon. Gentleman give us an assurance that we have not sunk to a condition in which we allow the West German Government to dictate conditions to us?

Mr. Heath: Nobody is dictating conditions to anybody on either side. If there is to be progress, it must be by negotiation.

Oral Answers to Questions — DISARMAMENT

Committees of Experts

Mr. P. Noel-Baker: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether Her Majesty's Gov-

ernment will put forward written proposals for the creation of a United Nations committee of experts to prepare a detailed plan of disarmament and inspection.

Mr. Godber: My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has already proposed to the United Nations the appointment of a series of Committees of Experts to discuss the necessary verification procedures and I do not see why this system should not later be extended to other matters. But we must first resolve the fundamental disagreements on how to reconcile disarmament with national security. These can only be tackled at the political level and in multilateral negotiations, and it is for the resumption of such negotiations that we and the United States Government are working hard at present.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Are the Government proposing to put forward any suggestions for a concrete plan of action to be discussed by the committees or the political representatives when they meet?

Mr. Godber: I think that the best way to proceed in this is for the present discussions between the Americans and the Russians to be carried on, and this matter will then come before the United Nations at the next meeting of the General Assembly. We are perfectly willing to put forward proposals if we can see a way of making progress, but I think that we should see how the present discussions work out.

Mr. Noel-Baker: But are we preparing a plan ourselves, so that we leave the realm of general phrases and get down to work?

Mr. Godber: We have been in close discussion with the Americans on this matter and I think that it is better that we should work together on this. I think that any fresh individual plan will not really help things forward, particularly at this moment.

Mr. G. H. R. Rogers: asked the Lord Privy Seal what representations have been made by Her Majesty's Government to the Governments of the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics concerning the recommencement of negotiations for general and complete disarmament.

Mr. Godber: We have made no formal representations to either Government. But we have been and continue to be in constant touch with the United States Government on this matter. Nor is there any reason to think that the Soviet Government are not fully aware of our attitude.

United States and U.S.S.R. (Discussions)

Mr. P. Noel-Baker: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether Her Majesty's Government will propose to the Governments of the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, now about to engage in new talks, that the Government of Peking shall be invited to send a representative to take part in any new negotiations about disarmament which may be begun.

Mr. Godber: No, Sir. I should point out that the talks to which the right bon. Gentleman refers began on 19th June.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Is it not becoming more and more plain every day that unless the Chinese take part in these negotiations very soon it may be too late, because they may refuse to do so?

Mr. Godber: I realise the difficulties of this, but I think that my right hon. Friend dealt with it in his supplementary answer on 20th March. We want to see them brought in at the appropriate moment, but we do not want to com- plicate the initial moves, and so hold up the start of these discussions in any way.

Mr. A. Hendersonasked the Lord Privy Seal what proposals he has made to the United States Government, in view of the official conversations now taking place in Washington between the United States and Soviet Governments, with regard to the association of : 

Mr. Godber: I have at present nothing to add to the answer to a similar Question by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Ashfield (Mr. Warbey) on 28th June.

Mr. Henderson: Can we not be told whether Her Majesty's Government are actually making proposals along these lines to the United States Government for discussion with the Soviet Government? In view of the fact that during the last six years disarmament negotiations have taken place entirely between Governments representing N.A.T.O. and the Warsaw Pact, is it not time that we invited such neutral countries as India, Yugoslavia and Sweden to take part in the disarmament negotiations?

Mr. Godber: We are certainly not opposed to it. It is just a question of such arrangements as can be made. We are in discussion in the normal way with the United States, and the arrangements could include the principle the right hon. and learned Gentleman has in mind.

Mr. Warbey: If the Minister accepts the principle, will he say where the difficulty lies? Surely he must recognise the tremendous faith which the non-aligned countries have in disarmament and the great contribution they could make in building bridges between the opposing sides.

Mr. Godber: I recognise that they can play a useful part. The difficulty would be when it came eventually to fixing the exact numbers concerned, and so on. I think that it is far better to leave this to the informal discussions that are now taking place, and which will embrace this sort of thing. I think that the best means of making progress, which the whole House wants, is to leave it as it stands at the present moment.

Oral Answers to Questions — CONVENTION ON GENOCIDE

Sir B. Janner: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether Her Majesty's Government will now accede to the Convention on Genocide in view of the repeated anti-Semitic activities of Nazis and neo-Nazis.

Mr. Godber: I am not yet in a position to add to what I said in my speech in the House on 5th June.

Sir B. Janner: Does the Minister of State realise that time is extremely important in this matter now? Twelve years have passed since the Convention was accepted, and we have, for our part, made no move at all. Is he aware that,


throughout the world, moneys which were extracted from the unhappy victims of Nazism, the 6 million who died, brutally murdered and tortured, are being utilised by Nazis all over the world in order to carry on further anti-Semitic activities? The matter is extremely serious. Will he do something about it?

Mr. Godber: I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman's point of view, as I made plain in our earlier debate, but I do not think that the point he has just raised would be assisted by our adherence to the Convention. I remind him that there are special problems in relation to Article 7 of the Convention and the right of this country to give asylum in certain cases which must be given most careful consideration.

Sir B. Janner: I think that this is a most unsatisfactory state of affairs. Although I have raised it before on the Adjournment, I beg to give notice that I must seek an early opportunity of pressing the Minister by raising the matter again on the Adjournment.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member may give notice, but, please, no speech.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIRCUSES AND VARIETY PERFORMANCES (EXCHANGES)

Mrs. Braddock: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether he will make it a condition of future grants to the British Council that they should encourage circus and variety performances with a view to arranging exchanges of those performances with countries overseas.

Mr. Godber: No, Sir. It is Her Majesty's Government's view that per- formances of this nature can best be arranged through normal commercial channels.

Mrs. Braddock: Is the Minister aware that circuses and variety acts in this country are not included in cultural recreations and that there is great concern about this among those who are organised in the Variety Artistes' Federation? This is the only country where circus and variety acts may not go abroad in the way that such acts may come to this country. Does not he think that it is time that the whole matter

was reconsidered in order to bring circuses and variety acts within terms which will allow them to go outside this country in the way I suggest?

Mr. Godber: I assure the hon. Lady that there is no invidious distinction here at all. We honestly feel that the most effective way is through the normal commercial channels, which is how these things are usually arranged. I do not think that there is any difficulty arising now, although I should be happy to discuss it with the hon. Lady if she thinks that there is.

Mr. Paget: May we take it from that reply that Her Majesty's Government is no longer in favour of Summit Conferences?

Mr. Ellis Smith: That is not very clever.

Oral Answers to Questions — EUROPE (BRITISH FORCES)

Mr. Shinwell: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether Her Majesty's Government's representative on the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Council of Ministers has informed that body of United Kingdom intentions to reduce British forces in Europe.

Mr. Heath: No statements on this subject have been made this year by Her Majesty's representative to the North Atlantic Council.

Mr. Shinwell: Presumably the Minister is aware of what his right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor said about this matter and the need for reducing our military forces overseas. If anything is done in Europe, will it be on grounds of economy, or are the troops to be withdrawn to Kuwait?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir my right hon. and learned Friend made the point that the burden of keeping forces overseas is very great and that some way must be found of dealing with the problem. It may be that in Europe a fairer sharing of the cost could be reached.

Mr. Shinwell: Does that mean that troops are likely to be withdrawn from Europe?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir. No decisions have been taken on this matter. My


right hon. and learned Friend was making a very general point.

Mr. G. Brown: Do those answers mean that Her Majesty's Government are considering reducing our present commitment in Germany, which is already less than we undertook to keep there? Are we reconsidering the number of troops there?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir; I did not say that. I said that my right hon. and learned Friend's statement referred to all our forces overseas.

Oral Answers to Questions — FOREIGN MINISTERS' CONFERENCE (WESTERN PEACE PROPOSALS)

Mr. Warbey: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether the Western peace proposals, tabled at the Foreign Ministers' Conference in May, 1959, are still regarded by Her Majesty's Government as inseparable.

Mr. Heath: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Warbey: Is the right hon. Gentleman seriously suggesting that there is any prospect of a peaceful settlement of the German question so long as the Western Powers insist that there can be no consideration, for example, of the Macmillan-Khrushchev proposals for a demilitarised zone in Central Europe until after the creation of an all-German Government with full authority to remain a member of N.A.T.O.?

Mr. Heath: These proposals were put forward by the West in 1959 as a comprehensive plan with the object of giving safeguards for European security to all the parties concerned. Therefore, they should be considered as a whole.

Oral Answers to Questions — KUWAIT

Mr. A. Henderson: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will make a statement on the present situation on the borders of Iraq and Kuwait.

Mr. Healey: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will make a statement on the situation in Kuwait.

Mr. Heath: Nothing has occurred to remove our anxiety concerning the Iraqi

threat to the independence of Kuwait, and our defensive build-up has proceeded according to plan. The Security Council is today resuming its consideration of the Kuwaiti complaint, and a Kuwaiti delegation is on its way to New York.

Mr. Henderson: Is the Iraq-Kuwait border clearly defined? In any event, would it not be a good thing if the British-Kuwaiti Forces were kept several miles away from the border so as to minimise the risk of border incidents?

Mr. Heath: The right hon. and learned Gentleman will realise that in desert country such as that of the Kuwait-Iraq border it is very difficult to find precisely on the ground where the border is, although it is defined on the map. From that point of view, I agree that there is a great deal in what the right hon. and learned Gentleman says.

Mr. Healey: I recognise that Her Majesty's Government had no option but to accede to the Ruler's request for assistance last week, but will he agree that the scale of the operation now being mounted imposes serious military strains upon this country's defensive forces and, if continued indefinitely, will impose serious political and economic dangers on the country as a whole? For that reason, have Her Majesty's Government any plan in mind for trying to transfer their share of the burden for the defence of Kuwait, and, in particular, will they make some proposal that the United Nations should join in this work?

Mr. Heath: We are anxious that we should have in Kuwait only the forces necessary to be able to meet the threat from Iraq, and we shall have no more forces there than are necessary for that purpose. Until we are satisfied that the threat has disappeared, and the Ruler of Kuwait, as an independent country, is satisfied, we must see that there is effective defence against any attack.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: It may be much too early to talk about the establishment of permanent security forces in Kuwait, but will my right hon. Friend take note of the grave danger of allowing what might be called normal United Nations Forces to take up a position there as they are so liable to infiltration by Iraq and other Arab countries? Will he make absolutely certain


that, if any foreign force is ultimately established there, the British will have a very important component part to play in it?

Mr. Heath: That was why, in answer to the hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey), I used the expression that any defence must seem to be effective to both the Ruler of Kuwait and ourselves.

Mr. Healey: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer my earlier question? Have Her Majesty's Government any plan in mind for requiring the introduction of some form of United Nations force into Kuwait?

Mr. Heath: This matter is under consideration at the United Nations and discussions will take place there very shortly. We are, of course, considering what steps we should take there. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said that our minds are not closed to it, but the immediate need is to be able to deal with the threat which still remains.

Mr. P. Noel-Baker: In order to avoid the risk, in the interval before a United Nations force could go there, that British troops might be engaged against the Iraq Army which they have so recently been training, will the Government propose to the United Nations that they should establish a neutralised zone under United Nations observance, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has proposed?

Mr. Heath: This is another proposition which can be considered, no doubt, in due course. At the moment, the main thing is to be able to deal with the threat which remains.

Mr. G. H. R. Rogers: asked the Lord Privy Seal what recent consultations there have been with the Ruler of Kuwait concerning the defence of the state of Kuwait in view of the latest developments there.

Mr. Heath: Her Majesty's Government have been in constant consultation with the Ruler concerning the defence of Kuwait, and have taken the necessary action there.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will publish a White Paper on the situation in Kuwait.

Mr. Heath: I will bear this suggestion in mind.

Mr. Hughes: Is the Lord Privy Seal aware that the sooner he comes to a decision about this the better? If this is a major military operation, could not the people of this country be told what it is all about and the background? Is he aware that this operation looks suspiciously like the old Suez operation which cut off this country's oil supplies? Could he explain why this occurs a week after the Chancellor of the Exchequer has told us that it is necessary to cut overseas military expenditure?

Mr. Heath: The text of the Exchange of Notes on 19th June, which I announced to the House, has been published as a White Paper and is now available in the Vote Office. The Prime Minister made a very full statement to the House about this on Monday. The purpose of the operation is to meet the request of the Ruler of Kuwait for defence against a threat from Iraq. It is carrying out our obligations under paragraph (d) of the Exchange of Notes.

Mr. A. Henderson: In making up his mind, will the Lord Privy Seal bear in mind the rather extravagant historical justification contained in the speech made by General Kassim when he laid claim to this territory?

Mr. Heath: I will, indeed. I said we would bear the suggestion in mind in order to choose the right moment when there is sufficient information to publish in the White Paper.

Mr. Rankin: asked the Lord Privy Seal what representations he has received from members of the Arab League following the decision of Her Majesty's Government to land troops in Kuwait.

Mr. Heath: None, Sir.

Mr. Rankin: Would it not be very helpful in this venture if we could be assured of the good will of the Arab League? Is it not the case that it has met very recently and come to a decision? Could the right hon. Gentleman say whether or not he has any inkling of what the attitude of the members of the Arab League, apart from Saudi-Arabia, is in this matter? How does the balance of opinion lie?

Mr. Heath: I think that all the Arab countries, with the exception of Iraq, sent messages of support and congratulation on the occasion of the Exchange of Notes about the independence of Kuwait. I have no knowledge of the Arab League's having reached a decision in the last few days since the events in Kuwait.

Mr. Rankin: Has the verbal support been manifested in any other way, say by the support of troops?

Mr. Heath: No, sir, Saudi-Arabia is the only country which has offered the support of troops and has, in fact, sent a token force.

Mr. Healey: Does not the Lord Privy Seal agree that it is a very peculiar thing that our soldiers should be shoulder to shoulder with Saudi-Arabian troops in Kuwait although our two Government at the moment have no diplomatic relations? Have the Government any intention—in view of the fact that we may soon be co-belligerents with Saudi-Arabia—of resuming negotiations for the restoration of diplomatic relations?

Mr. Heath: As it is always said that British troops are the best ambassadors in the world, it may be that this will lead to a better relationship.

Mr. S. Silverman: Could the right hon. Gentleman make it clear to the House that 40 per cent. of the oil on which this country's industry depends comes from Kuwait and that our troops are there in order to defend it because the Government think they cannot defend it in any other way? If those facts are made clear, does he not think that our reputation in the world would be just a trifle higher than by this constant humbug and pretence about the protection of the Ruler of Kuwait? If we are there for protection of our own interests, why not say so frankly?

Mr. Heath: The whole world knows that we have very great interests—

Mr. Silverman: Why bother about the Ruler?

Mr. Heath: —as indeed have other countries and nationals, in the oil which is either in Kuwait or adjacent to Kuwait. Kuwait achieved independence. Only a fortnight ago we offered protection for

Kuwait's independence. I notice that the hon. Member is very careful in his choice of countries which ought to have their independence protected for them. This is a case where we undertook obligations and we are carrying them out.

Oral Answers to Questions — PORTUGAL (SUPPLY OF ARMS)

Mr. Swingler: asked the Lord Privy Seal what quantities and types of British arms have been supplied to Portugal in each of the last 12Months; what conditions have been attached in each case; and on what date Her Majesty's Government not to employ these arms in overseas territories.

Mr. Dugdale: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will state the amount and value of naval, military and air equipment sent directly to Portuguese overseas territories during the past year.

Mr. Driberg: asked the Lord Privy Seal if he will publish in HANSARD details of all arms exported to Portugal between 1st January and 15th March, 1961, and since 15th March; and what steps are being taken to ensure that arms supplied to Portugal for use in the fulfilment of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation obligations will not be used in the Portuguese overseas territories.

Mr. Heath: As it is not the policy of Her Majesty's Government to give details of arms supplied for foreign Governments, I have nothing to add to the replies given by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on 27th June and yesterday.

Mr. Swingler: On the eve of a debate on the situation in Angola, is the Lord Privy Seal telling the House that we are not entitled to know what quantities of British arms have been supplied to be used by the Portuguese to massacre the people in Angola? Does he propose to refuse this information to the House? Will he tell us how the Government will ensure that arms now supplied to Portugal will not continue to be used to massacre people in Angola?

Mr. Heath: It is a long-standing policy of Governments on both sides of the House not to give details of arms supplied to other countries, whether by Governments or by private purchase. With regard to policy towards Portugal and


Angola, it has been clearly announced to the House that any orders for Portuguese overseas territories are in suspense. As for Portugal herself, the arms are examined to see whether they are in accord with her N.A.T.O. requirements. It is for the Government to decide whether that is so or not.

Mr. Driberg: Could the right hon. Gentleman say why he has not answered the second part of Question No. 29, which does not ask for details and which the Prime Minister did not answer yesterday? Will the right hon. Gentleman please answer it now? What steps are being taken?

Mr. Heath: The steps being taken are that the arms which are supplied have to be seen by Her Majesty's Government to be in accordance with N.A.T.O. requirements.

Mr. Dugdale: With regard to Question No. 27, is it not a fact that no arms were supplied last year directly to Portuguese territories because they were all sent to Portugal for trans-shipment? Does not this make complete nonsense of the Prime Minister's promise not to send any in future?

Mr. Heath: I do not think it does, because, as I explained, supplies of arms have to be seen to be within N.A.T.O. requirements.

Mr. Healey: is it not a fact that almost the whole of Portugal's effective fighting forces are at present serving in Angola and that therefore any arms sent to Portugal are likely to be used there rather than anywhere else? Can the Lord Privy Seal give a straight answer to a straight question: have Her Majesty's Government asked the Portuguese Government for any assurances that arms supplied under N.A.T.O. arrangements will not be used in Angola?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir. The arms which are supplied for N.A.T.O. requirements are very often, in fact almost entirely, of a different type from the sort of arms which can be used in a colonial territory or colonial type of territory such as Angola.

Mr. M. Foot: When the right hon. Gentleman relies on precedent in this matter and says that these figures are

not generally revealed to the House, will he recall that at the time of Suez the detailed figures of arms supplied during the previous few years to Egypt and Israel were given to this House? Will he look up those figures? Is it because we happen to have this alliance with Portugal that facts similar to those which were revealed on a previous occasion are denied to the House?

Mr. Heath: I will look up the precedent cited by the hon. Gentleman, but the statement of general policy as I made it remains.

Mr. P. Noel-Baker: Are not we bound under the Arms Traffic Convention of 1920 to publish licences of arms which we sell abroad? Have the Government repudiated that obligation?

Mr. Heath: No, Sir, but I will see what our obligations are under that Convention.

Oral Answers to Questions — NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANISATION

Mr. Zilliacus: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether he will instruct the Government's representatives in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation to insist that all contingency planning should be based on strict respect for the restrictions on the right to resort to force laid down in the Charter of the United Nations.

Mr. Heath: The plans and policies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation are, as has been repeatedly stated, purely defensive and fully consistent with the United Nations Charter.

Mr. Zilliacus: Will the right hon. Gentleman give a clear reply to the effect that the Government will not associate themselves with any contingency planning which contemplates resort to force without the authorisation of the Security Council, except as a measure of defence against armed attack? Is he aware that resort to force in any other circumstances would constitute aggression and violation of the Charter? Will he assure the House and the country that the Government's contingency planning does not include aggression and violation of the Charter?

Mr. Heath: We shall continue to plan for all eventualities and to carry out our obligations under the Charter.

Mr. Zilliacus: In view of the completely unsatisfactory and, in fact, menacing nature of the right hon. Gentleman's reply, I give notice that I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment at the first opportunity.

Oral Answers to Questions — LAOS

Mr. Hayman: asked the Lord Privy Seal whether he will make a further statement concerning the negotiations to establish a neutral status for Laos.

Mr. Heath: The Prime Minister of Laos, Prince Boun Oum, held conversations with Prince Souvanna Phouma and Prince Souphanouvong at Zurich from 18th to 22nd June. The three Princes issued a communiqué recording their agreement in principle to form a provisional coalition government and a single delegation to the Conference at Geneva. The communiqué also outlined a list of tasks to which the new Government would address itself when formed, including the pursuit of a neutral policy. The three Princes have announced their intention to meet again in order to complete the task of making the new Government.
Meanwhile, discussion has continued in Geneva on the various proposals which have been tabled.

Mr. Hayman: When does the right hon. Gentleman expect a further conference to take place? Does he agree that unless it takes place soon and agreement is reached there is danger of Laos becoming divided into two States instead of being unified as an independent and neutral State?

Mr. Heath: The date does not depend on us, but we understand that the three Princes have it in mind to meet during the course of this month. As to the latter part of the supplementary question, I think that all the parties to the Geneva Conference have announced their desire to see a unified as well as an independent neutral Laos.

Mr. Healey: Will the Lord Privy Seal clear up confusion, at any rate in my mind, about Press reports of an agreement which may or may not have been reached concerning the supply of transport and other facilities to the International Commission in Laos?

Mr. Heath: The Conference has been discussing the request of the Commission and how this should be met, but it has not yet been possible to reach agreement between the two Co-Chairmen as to the way it should be done.

Oral Answers to Questions — EMPLOYMENT

Remploy Factory, Birmingham

Mr. Cleaver: asked the Minister of Labour what progress has been made regarding the closing of the Remploy factory, Clay Lane, Birmingham; what use will be made of the old buildings; and whether he will make a statement.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Alan Green): It has been decided to bring the two Remploy factories in Birmingham under one roof. This will cause no loss of employment, and the workers have been given assurances that they will not be adversely affected in any way. The change will make possible substantial savings in running costs and overheads. The premises at Yardley will be relinquished.

Mr. Cleaver: Would my hon. Friend say whether or not the same number of work places will be available for disabled men?

Mr. Green: Remploy has assured me that there will be no loss of work or reduction in the number of severely disabled employed. I am, indeed, hopeful that, on the contrary, the new combined factory at Garretts Green will be more accessible by public transport and it may be possible to place additional Section 2 cases in employment there.

United States Air Force Station, Bruntingthorpe (Closure)

Mr. Farr: asked the Minister of Labour what steps are being taken to assist those who will become unemployed when the United States Air Force station at Bruntingthorpe is closed.

Mr. Green: Arrangements will be made for the advance registration of employees at Bruntingthorpe before discharges begin in March, 1962.

Mr. Farr: Whilst thanking my hon. Friend for that reply, may I ask him to


bear in mind that a number of these employees are of a specialised category who are not easy to place in normal civilian work?

Mr. Green: I appreciate that there may be difficulties in a few cases, but fortunately unemployment is very low in the whole area and I hope that those cases will be very few indeed.

Commercial Apprenticeship Scheme

Mr. Boyden: asked the Minister of Labour how many boys and girls, respectively, have been apprenticed through the commercial apprenticeship scheme since 31st August, 1959; and what percentage this represents of recruitment into clerical employment of the relevant age group.

Mr. Green: Ninety-eight boys and three girls between 16 and 18 were enrolled under the Commercial Apprenticeship Scheme in the year ended 31st August, 1960. This represents 0·2 per cent. of the number of boys and girls in this age group taking up clerical work. The scheme is for the training of candidates for executive posts, and the field of recruitment is therefore much smaller than that for clerical work.

Mr. Boyden: Can the Parliamentary Secretary explain why the Minister of Labour boasted about the high number of people entering clerical employment when he spoke in the apprenticeship debate? This is one example of apprenticeship training where there are serious deficiencies, and there are other wide areas as well. Can he give reasons why more efforts are not made to encourage clerical apprenticeship schemes?

Mr. Green: I agree that the increase hoped for has not been achieved, but it should be remembered that a number of firms have their own schemes for training, both for executive posts and general clerical duties. Unfortunately, the figures are not available for people trained under those arrangements, but I am informed

that the number is appreciable. However, there is no doubt that more systematic training is required.

Youth Employment Bureaux

Mr. Boyden: asked the Minister of Labour whether alternative accommodation has yet been found for the eleven youth employment bureaux reported on by the Youth Employment Advisory Committee as unsatisfactory and for which suitable premises had not been found by 2nd May, 1960.

Mr. Green: Of these eleven offices, whose premises were criticised by inspectors of the Central Youth Employment Executive, alternative accommodation has been found for four, and in two cases is already in use. Efforts are being continued to obtain alternative premises for the other seven.

Mr. Boyden: Is not this another example of the Ministry of Labour dragging its feet in relation to the Youth Employment Service? Surely it is high time that these officers were found suitable accommodation?

Mr. Green: I do not think it is a question of the Ministry dragging its feet. In many areas it is difficult to find existing suitable accommodation. Of the seven offices for which alternative accommodation has still to be found, four are part-time. I am sure the hon. Member would agree that we cannot build very fast for part-time use.

SCOTTISH AFFAIRS

Matters of Science and Industry in Scotland and Arts and Recreational Amenities in Scotland, being matters relating exclusively to Scotland, referred to the Scottish Grand Committee for their consideration.—[Mr. R. A. Butler.]

ADJOURNMENT

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Redmayne.]

ANGOLA

3.31 p.m.

Mr. Hugh Gaitskell: For several weeks now public opinion in Britain has been deeply disturbed by reports of what has been happening in Angola. Churchmen, christians of all denominations, have been especially concerned, as is shown by the number of declarations and resolutions which have been carried and conveyed to the Government by the Methodist Church and the Baptist Church, and by the Council of Churches, which recently called on the Foreign Secretary.
In this House, over the last three months, we have put a large number of Questions to the Government, most of them, of course, concerned with the attitude and reaction of Her Majesty's Government to the news that was coming through from Angola. It is well known that the posture of Her Majesty's Government in this matter has been far from what we think it is desirable that it should be; and it is for that reason, in particular, that we wish to return to the subject this afternoon.
It is part of the Government's case that they do not know the facts. In a little while I will come to the question of the inquiry which is to be undertaken by the British Consul-General and other inquiries. For my part, I should have said that, in broad outline at any rate, the facts are not really in dispute.
First, it is not to be denied, I think, that Portugal is now the only remaining Western nation which refuses any advance or any hope of self-government to its colonies. Indeed, in their Colonial Act, the Portuguese specifically declare that it is
the duty of the Portuguese nation to fulfil their historic function of possessing and colonizing overseas dominions and of civilizing the native population inhabiting them.
That quotation, I think, is enough to show how very far back in the nineteenth century the attitude of Portugal still is today. While the rest of Africa, in the North, in the West, and in the East, has been advancing swiftly towards self-government and independence, the Portuguese Government have remained sunk in the past.
The second point which I think will not be denied is that the overwhelming

majority, perhaps 99 per cent., of the Africans in Angola not only have no hope whatever of proceeding to self-government, but they also have very little indeed in the way of civil rights. They are essentially classed as second-class citizens. They are subject to what is politely called contract labour. We used to call it forced labour, and I do not think that there is very much difference.
Thirdly, that on 15th March there was a revolt of the Africans in Angola—in the northern part particularly, although it stretched down into the colony—in the course of which several hundred Portuguese were massacred. Fourthly, that this was followed by immediate reprisals by civilians of an equally brutal and indiscriminate character. Fifthly, that there was then a military action initiated by the Portuguese Government and now continued, in the course of which it seems—here, one is not certain of the figures, but these are the figures given by the Baptist missionaries two months ago—that no fewer than 20,000 Africans have already been killed. I said that one could not be sure of these figures, but I think that we might as well take evidence from those who have been closest to this terrible event.
In addition—here I think that the figures are more reliable—it seems that by now about 100,000 Africans from Angola have crossed the border into exile into the Congo. We have read reports of the burning and bombing of villages and the indiscriminate shooting of Africans. It is even said—I say no more than that—that napalm bombs may have been used.
Reports of this kind of thing, as we all know, continue to come in almost every day. If the House has any doubt about this, doubt about what I have said so far, I can only offer hon. Members the mass of testimony, handed to me this morning by the Baptist Missionary Society, of conditions obtaining in Angola before March, and of what has been seen by Baptist missionaries themselves in the course of the last few months. It is not necessary for me to pass this testimony to the Lord Privy Seal because, I understand—I welcome it—that the Baptists are proposing to send him copies immediately. I hope that arrangements will be made for this testimony to be


published. I have only looked through it, but I think that any hon. Member who reads it cannot but be sickened and nauseated by the stories of cruelty and inhumanity which occur in its pages. I cannot see any reason why Baptist missionaries should invent these stories. Again and again they have made plain their affection for the territory of Angola. They have been extremely careful in their dealings with the Portuguese Government, and my impression is that it was only when they were simply overwhelmed by what was happening that they decided that they must do their best to rouse the conscience of the world.
There is no doubt about the reaction in Britain, and indeed in other places, among most people. It has been concentrated, and rightly, on two things. First, on the exceptionally savage character of the repression. We all know that in past years, in British Colonies, there have been revolts and there has been terrorism. We know that at one time or another British Governments have done things about which some of us, at any rate, have not been at all happy. But I know of nothing done by any British Government, certainly in the last fifty years, which could conceivably compare with the kind of thing that we are told is now happening in Angola.
The second point on which criticism is concentrated is what lies behind this, the rigid refusal of the Portuguese dictatorship to concede any rights or any hope of advance to self-government to the African. One of my hon. Friends says, quite rightly, that it concedes no advance in Portugal, either. Perhaps I may be allowed to say—this is very much at the root of the whole trouble—that I have always believed that it is impossible for a democracy, over a period, to maintain itself in an imperialistic and colonialist position. We cannot deny to the people of other countries what is claimed for ourselves. Equally, where a dictatorship does not allow the Portuguese people themselves any rights, it is very much more difficult to imagine that it will concede such rights to colonies.
What is the Government's attitude in all this? I do not believe for one moment that the Lord Privy Seal and his colleague the Foreign Secretary are indifferent to what is going on. I do not believe for one moment that they do not regret

what has happened as much as the rest of us, but I do accuse them of having so conducted their policy in these last three months as to have created an extremely bad impression upon the rest of the world.
I think that their policy has been foolish even if their fundamental emotions are themselves sound enough. For the British Government were not merely content throughout this period to remain silent, to do nothing, which in any case, in my view, would have been far from satisfactory, but they chose, in these months, to go out of their way to underline, by a number of different acts, their friendly relations with the Salazar régime. It is this which we on this side of the House find so extraordinary and of which we are particularly critical. I will mention seven different ways in which this has been done.
First, not once but, I think, at least five times—certainly on every occasion when the question of Angola has come up at the United Nations Security Council or Assembly—the British Government have ostentatiously abstained on motions critical of the Portuguese Government and done so at a time when the United States Government, represented by Mr. Adlai Stevenson, have on every occasion voted for those resolutions.
In the second place, there was the visit of H.M.S. "Leopard" to Angola right in the middle of the trouble. Thirdly, there was the so-called good will visit by the Foreign Secretary to Lisbon. Fourthly, there was the training exercise which we debated in this House not long ago, and which has been dropped. We are glad that it has been dropped, though, be it said, the reason for this, according to the Government, has nothing to do with what has happened in Angola but with what is happening in Kuwait. Then there was the sale of the two warships, which has not been stopped. There was the visit of units of the British Fleet to Lisbon only two or three weeks ago. And there was the refusal of the visa to Captain Galvao because—this was the reason given by the Government—they were afraid that he might make speeches here critical of the Portuguese Government.
Captain Galvao happens to have been the author of a famous report on the state of affairs in Angola and other Portuguese colonies in 1947. It was on that


account that he suffered exile. It was, no doubt, to talk about that sort of thing that he wanted to come to Britain. The Government say that they do not know the facts. They might at least have tried to get a little of the background by allowing him to come here.
I find it impossible to believe that all these seven instances were all coincidences. It seems to me far more probable that at some point—it may well have been in the course of the last year and some months ago—at some level in the Foreign Office; it may have been a low level—it was suggested that we ought to make a friendly gesture to the Portuguese Government. So somebody rang up the Admiralty and asked, "What can you do to help?" Then somebody rang up the War Office and asked, "Can you do something in this field?" And, gradually, a plan was worked out.
I, personally, do not believe that there was anything to be said for such a plan in any event, because I do not think that we need go out of our way ostentatiously to be friendly to a dictatorship even if it is a member of N.A.T.O. But, of course, after all these events in Angola it would have been very much wiser to have abandoned this plan altogether.
The excuses and the explanations which have been put forward by the Government have been extremely flimsy and quite unconvincing. They told us—it bears out what I said just now—that the visits, in particular, were all arranged before and could not be changed. What utter nonsense! If the Government had wished to show their marked disapproval of what was happening in Angola they could not have found a better way than by cancelling the visits. That would have been an admirable demonstration of British opinion.
Then there was the sale of arms. They have at last suspended the sale of arms and ammunition to Angola and to other Portuguese colonies, but, of course, there is no restriction on the sale of arms and ammunition to Portugal and there is nothing in the way of the Portuguese Government buying the arms and ammunition—they would probably go to Portugal, anyhow—and then sending them on to Angola. I have never seen such a farce, really—to suspend or pre-

vent arms and ammunition going to Angola when they can go freely to Portugal.
The British Government have never even considered what the Norwegian Government have done about this. There is no doubt about Mr. Lange's view. The Norwegian Government refused to sell ammunition to Portugal, and the interesting thing is that the feeling in Norway about the situation was inspired by the reports of our own missionaries. This is what The Times had to say about it:
Recent articles in the British Press on British missionaries' accounts of conditions in Angola have stirred Norwegian public opinion, and denunciations of Portuguese action have been strong in all political quarters.
I could have wished that the British Government had taken more notice of our own missionaries. They claim that the facts are not clear, but, as I said in reply to an interjection earlier, there really is no reason why we should doubt the accuracy and the truth of what those Baptist missionaries have told us.
The Foreign Secretary has now asked our Consul-General at Luanda to make a report to him. But why was this report not made earlier? What was to prevent the Consul-General from visiting the Northern Territories earlier? Has no information come in anyhow? And even if he now goes, I should like to ask, under what conditions exactly is he going? I understand that the only two people who will accompany him on our side are the military attaches from the Lisbon Embassy. They may—I do not know them—be impartial; they may be very concerned about it all; but I wonder just how far those people conducting the inquiry are to be free—for instance, to speak privately to Africans.
I wonder how far the Africans will feel sufficiently safe to speak to them at all; I wonder whether the Consul-General will be allowed to go over the border with the Congo and talk to the refugees who are pouring in on the other side. I wonder whether he will be allowed to speak to Mr. Roberto Holden, the leader of the United Angolan Peoples, the leader, in other words, of the nationalist revolt there.
And why, if this has been the problem, if the Government really had serious doubts about what was going on, did they not support the proposal for a


United Nations inquiry? After all, when this was first brought up at the Security Council the United Kingdom abstained, and managed to prevent, with some other countries as well, though not the United States, the Security Council from taking any action. We abstained again when the matter came up to the United Nations Assembly, but, happily, this resolution in favour of an inquiry was carried by a large majority.
That brings me to the strange story of our behaviour in the United Nations. As I have said already, on a number of occasions, certainly at least five, we have just abstained. The Foreign Secretary the other day, speaking in another place, made it plain that the reason we abstained on all those resolutions, apparently, was that they were tied up in some way with the anti-colonialist resolution passed by the Assembly on 14th December last. I find that a very lame excuse. If this really was the reason why is it there was such a difference of opinion between Mr. Adlai Stevenson and the Foreign Secretary?
Most of us, after all, would agree that Mr. Stevenson is a reasonable, highly intelligent and humane man. Yet he found no difficulty whatever in voting for these resolutions. Surely, if there was objection on these grounds—and I will come to the detail of it in a moment—would it not have been possible for Her Majesty's Government, if they objected to certain words in these resolutions, to put down another resolution also critical of the Portuguese Government, although not perhaps in those particular terms? Or they could have done what I suggested to the Prime Minister some months ago it would be much wiser to do?—that is, when we have a long resolution, as in the case of the famous anti-colonial resolution of last December, and we do not like certain words in it, for our people to say that they agree with the spirit of the resolution, that they do not agree with the particular interpretation that may be placed on certain words, but that they will nevertheless vote for it. That is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
If we look at the actual words to which they objected, I think that the House will agree that what I have suggested would have been a much wiser

course. The words in this very long resolution which they did not like, and I understand the reason, were these:
that inadequacy of political, economic, social or educational preparedness should never serve as a pretext for delaying independence and that immediate steps should be taken in trust and non-self-governing countries or all other territories, which have not yet attained independence to transfer all powers to the peoples of those territories without any conditions or reservations.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke,: Oh.

Mr. Gaitskell: These are rather strong terms. But I would say to he noble Lord, if he is arguing on words with me, what does this ask for? It asks for immediate steps to be taken. Is there anything wrong about that? Why should not immediate steps be taken? It does not say that immediate transfer of power should take place. If we prefer not to argue it on legalistic lines, which I myself would regret, but to treat it in the context of the whole resolution, which I think is very much the wiser course, it leads to far less misundertanding if we vote for it and explain our reservations on these particular lines.

Mr. A. Fenner Brockway: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Minister has stated in the House today that the Government are now to adopt another policy on these resolutions and are to ignore this one?

Mr. Gaitskell: I am coming to that. That has already been announced in another place by the Foreign Secretary, and I welcome it. It certainly goes some way along precisely the lines that I have indicated, although it is far from clear from what the Foreign Secretary said exactly what the Government are to do.
As I understand, these words, when they appear in the preamble to a motion are in future to be ignored. I am glad that the Foreign Secretary has at last reached this conclusion. Could not he have got his mind to work on it a little earlier and have prevented some of this damage being done? It is not as if this were a new problem. We had exchanges of views on this in the House last January and one would have supposed that by now the Foreign Secretary would have got around to it.
Two other excuses have been put forward by the Government. The first is


that despite all these seven things they have done, they do not, of course, side with the Portuguese Government and no one need suppose that they do. I have already said that I do not think that Her Majesty's Government are in sympathy with the repressive measures taken in Angola, but they must surely understand just how what they have done has been misunderstood elsewhere in the world, certainly in Africa and Asia by a number of different leaders whom I could quote this afternoon. Because of these votes, because of the sale of weapons and because of the abstentions on resolutions it has been widely assumed that we, in some way or another, were especially friendly with the Portuguese Government at the present time. Is that surprising?
If, at the time of the Hungarian uprising, we had sent the right hon. Gentleman on a good will visit, or we had proposed to sell some arms, or we had refused a visit to Anna Kethly when she wanted to come here to tell us what was going on there, is it not obvious that the world would have thought that we were approving what had been done there? We could not have avoided such a conclusion.
The second argument being put forward is that Portugal is a member of N.A.T.O. and one of our allies and that we must be careful what we say about her political activities. What are the political objects of N.A.T.O. members? They are laid down in the Treaty:
To safeguard the freedom, common heritage and civilisation of their peoples founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law.
Unfortunately, it is precisely these principles which are being torn to shreds in Angola and Portugal today. If we have to choose between standing by the principles of the alliance, or being ostentatiously friendly with an ally which betrays these principles, can it be doubted that we must choose the former course?
I know that there are some people who despise the whole idea that the alliance should have political ideals. They regard it as just a matter of national self-interest and say that we need never be, and should never be, concerned with the type of government

or the policies adopted by other members. I believe this to be a profoundly dangerous point of view. I have never supported the idea that N.A.T.O. should develop into an aggressive anti-Communist crusade, nor would I say that it is possible to insist that every member must have a complete Parliamentary democracy on British lines, but it would be a disastrous error to try to eliminate the moral and ideological element in the alliance. Whenever a member country departs from democracy, liberty and the rule of law it does the alliance grave harm. If this process went too far it would destroy the alliance altogether.
Precisely because most of us in the West are democracies, where the Governments are influenced and can be changed by the people, the attitude of the people matters, and the attitude of a people is affected by how its allies behave. It is affected by whether they think their cause is a just one, and whether they think that they have a way of life which is worth defending against the Communist threat. Is it not obvious that our major argument against that threat is that we continue to enjoy democracy and freedom and that we do not wish to give it up? Remove that argument by removing democracy and freedom and there is precious little left of our case.
All this is the more important today in view of the concentration of the cold war in uncommitted and underdeveloped territories. Most of these territories have recently been colonial areas, and, therefore, we are faced inevitably with certain serious disadvantages in trying to win the cold war. We suffer from the disadvantage that, for instance, most of the Western countries are very much richer than the poorer countries of Africa and Asia. We suffer from the disadventage that there is still a good deal of emotion which can easily be aroused against ex-colonial Powers.
In fact—and this is in a way the tragedy of the whole thing—Great Britain and the West generally, France certainly, has in all these ways a good record over the last fifteen years. Between them, Britain and France, I suppose, have given freedom and independence to about 800 million people during this period. On the other hand,


the Soviet Union, by expanding Communist power over Eastern Europe, has, in fact, brought under its domain hundreds of millions of people in Europe.
We surely should be emphasising this. We should be trying to win over the people of these territories by making plain what we have done and what the Communists have not done. But we shall never make our case so long as we appear to condone or support an avowedly reactionary régime in Angola, whose activities have shocked the world and gravely embarrassed the Western alliance.

4.0 p.m.

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Edward Heath): The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition has rightly described the situation in Angola today as extremely serious. He has said, again rightly, that events in Angola have caused the whole House and the people of this country, as I said at Question Time today and, as the right hon. Gentleman has also acknowledged, Her Majesty's Government the greatest distress. We recognise the far-reaching effects which these events are bound to have in Africa, on the Europeans there, and on the African countries, and we fully understand how strongly not only Africans but people everywhere must feel about them.
I think that the House will acknowledge, whatever criticisms it may make, that our own distress is the greater, because these events have occurred in the territories of a country with whom we have had a long-standing friendship. I hope that the House will agree with me, as I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will, when I say that I hope that whatever we may say in the debate may be directed towards the sole object of improving this situation and using the influence of this House for good in what are very difficult circumstances indeed.
This has been the object of the policy of Her Majesty's Government throughout these last few months. I recognise that some hon. Members opposite may disagree, and will no doubt say so in the course of the debate, with the manner in which this policy has been carried out, but the right hon. Gentleman himself acknowledged that we ourselves in Her Majesty's Government were bound to dislike many of the things which have

happened in Angola. If hon. Members disagree with the policy and the way in which it has been carried out, at least I hope that they will accept the honesty of our motives in trying to use such influence as we have to secure a peaceful settlement of the troubles existing at present in Angola. I am sure that unless we set out today with this object in view in the debate, nothing but harm can come from it.
The Leader of the Opposition mentioned the question of information about events there. A great deal of information has been presented to us by the missionaries who have come back from Angola. There have also been other accounts. It has been difficult to check or corroborate. We have no means of securing the information and no means necessarily of obtaining it from the authorities.
I should like briefly to go over the main points of the history of these events, which has already been touched upon by the right hon. Gentleman. Until February this year, everything was apparently quiet in Angola. Whatever the effects of Portuguese colonial policy and whatever the views about it may have bean, there were few signs of unrest. It is true, or it is believed to be so, that the Africans disliked the Portuguese decree in 1953 whereby the asimilado could lose his citizenship and a white Portuguese citizen could not. It is also true that the African coffee growers have for long complained that they were not getting a fair price for their produce from the authorities.

Mr. Leslie Hale: I try to listen to the right hon. Gentleman with great respect, but I feel that he has forgotten to refer to the history of fifty years, starting with C. R. W. Nevinson, Joseph Conrad and other eminent writers, in which brutality and slave labour were established. Dr. Salazar's approval of it in 1937 has been rather gently dismissed by a reference to some discrimination against Portuguese wives. This question of slave labour was one which even William Cadbury failed to refute and this same question the I.L.O. could not get Portugal to answer.

Mr. Heath: Whatever views may be held about Portuguese colonial policy, these were the recent events to which I


was referring. The disturbances began in Luanda on 4th and 5th February. There were attacks on police stations and on prisons. It is not clear what lay behind them unless it was to release those who were detained. [Interruption.] It is very difficult to form a judgment on what lay behind them and I think that the hon. Member should for once be fair in allowing that fact.
The troubles in the North began in the middle of March in the Province of Malange, to the north of Luanda along the Angola-Congo border. There were attacks by Africans on villages on the border and on settlements in the interior. These showed some signs of being planned and co-ordinated. They were indeed brutal and, as the Leader of the Opposition has acknowledged, a large number of Portuguese settlers were massacred on their farms. Again, no precise figures are available, but it is estimated that between 800 and 1,000 Portuguese settlers were killed. That is a very considerable number, especially when one compares it with the numbers of those killed in our own territories, for example, during the Mau Mau period or other terrorist campaigns.
It was these outrages that led to retaliation by Portuguese settlers. Fearful of being wiped out themselves, they took the law into their own hands, partly from fear and partly no doubt from a desire for revenge. They attacked the Africans in their own territories. No one condones this and the Portuguese authorities themselves, whose military forces at that time were small and limited, certainly do not condone these outrages. They did their best to use their forces to prevent atrocities or extremist action of this kind. There is no doubt that it is from these original bitter racial disturbances and massacres that the reports which the missionaries have sent back and made available to us in the Foreign Office have largely sprung.

Mr. R. T. Paget: When the right hon. Gentleman says that the Portuguese have recognised that these ought to be condemned, can he say whether there has been one word from the Salazar Government condemning the massacres carried out by the civilian population with arms supplied to them by the Government?

Mr. Heath: Yes, a statement was issued by the Portuguese Government, on Monday, denying that they had condoned activities of this kind and denying, also, that they were using repressive measures themselves. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I am only endeavouring to state the facts. The hon. and learned Member asked whether it had ever been said by the Portguese Government.
Since then, the rebels have continued to attack both Africans and Europeans and they have appeared to have concentrated on damage to communications, to roads and bridges. The Portuguese Government, we understand, as far as we are able to obtain information, are now carrying out operations to clear obstacles to communications, to restore food supplies, to restore some form of law and order, and to protect those engaged in coffee picking.
There is also no doubt that the Portuguese are anxious to prevent excesses between Africans and Europeans of the kind that happened at the beginning of these disturbances, but, as I have already said, the amount of information we have is limited. As the Leader of the Opposition has said, much of it has been supplied to us by missionaries, but from the point of view of forming a judgment on who was responsible for any of these things, we have, as a Government, very limited means of doing that.
But there are three things which may help in this respect. First, as the right hon. Gentleman mentioned, a sub-committee has been set up by the United Nations Assembly. I will deal later with our voting and record at the United Nations. As I said at Question Time, we understand that the chairman of the sub-committee is in touch with the Portuguese Government and we hope, as we have frequently stated in public, that the Porguguese Government will cooperate with the sub-committee and make information available to it. The subcommittee has also directly approached Baptist missionaries in this country for information. I will certainly consider the point raised by the right hon. Gentleman about the publication of the evidence which he tells me the missionaries are to send to my noble Friend and to myself.
Secondly, there is the visit of the Consul-General accompanied by the two


attachés to the Northern Territories. There have been difficulties in their going there before, but we hope now that they will be able to see everything that we wish them to see. We are certainly anxious that they should, and that they should be able to talk to everybody to whom they wish to talk. Our own representatives in the Congo should also be able to talk to the refugees who are present either in Leopoldville or elsewhere in the Congo.
The third thing is that we should like to see the Portuguese Government giving greater facilities to Press correspondents to see the situation for themselves, and we understand that this may be possible. We certainly hope it will be. If the sub-committee is able to obtain information, if our own representatives are able to go to the Northern territories and if the Press correspondents can see for themselves, we shall have much more information on which to form a judgment. My noble Friend the Foreign Secretary was grateful to those who came to see him from the World Council of Churches—and I was present myself —to give us the information which they had available to them and to discuss with us the policy of Her Majesty's Government.
I should like to say now a word about the refugees. Various estimates have been made about the number, varying between 75,000 and just over 100,000. Again, we have no means of judging what the total number is. Many of them fled from fear of terrorism. Some fled from a wish to avoid being caught in any sort of military operations or in any strife between the rebels and the Portuguese troops. They have been looked after partly by the United Nations through the South Kasai Famine Relief Fund and other relief funds to which Her Majesty's Government and many voluntary organisations in this country have contributed. Other organisations which are helping the refugees with, among other things, medical supplies are the Red Cross, including the Portuguese Red Cross, the Congolese authorities and Caritas, a Catholic body. The Portuguese authorities have themselves helped the Angolan refugees in the Congo with two large consignments, sent from Lisbon, of food, medicines and blankets which

have been handed over to the International Red Cross specifically for the Angolan refugees.
There are now indications that many of the refugees are returning to Northern Angola. Again, estimates vary, but one estimate puts the number now as high as 20,000 returning to Angola. Again, we have no means of knowing how accurate those figures are.
Perhaps I could turn to the position of our own missionaries in Angola today. In the northern part of the territory, near the Congo, the Baptist mission at San Salvador do Congo continues to function with a staff of about six missionaries. Mothers and children have been withdrawn as a precautionary measure. Two mission stations have been closed at the request of the authorities, those at Bembe and Quibocolo. In the case of Bembe the whole town was evacuated by the Portuguese administration after hostilities had taken place in it. During the hostilities the mission, which was headed by Miss Edna Staple, looked after the wounded, but in the end they had no choice but to leave when the Portuguese administration itself left, and they dispersed the pupils at the mission school to their various villages.
In the case of Quibocolo, as I told the House on 28th June, the mission was asked by the Portuguese authorities to leave on grounds of security and there were three British missionaries affected. The Consul-General himself asked the Portuguese authorities the reason for this and was told that the order could not be changed on security grounds. Since then our Ambassador in Lisbon has taken the matter up and has asked for further information as to why this decision was taken. He also asked for an assurance that missions will be allowed to reopen after the risk to security has passed.
As far as missionaries in South and Central Angola are concerned, there are ten different stations in the centre of the territory with about 20 adults and 13 children in them. We have no reports at all to indicate that the missionaries in that part of the country are being hampered in carrying on their normal work.
If I may sum up briefly the Government's view of these events, we deeply deplore the loss of life, both African


and European. Where there have been atrocities we utterly condemn them, whoever has committed them. When racial passions are roused, fear and prejudice take control and the results are grievous for everyone. But help and succour for the refugees has been forthcoming, in part from that provided by the Government and voluntary bodies in this country, for use in the Congo. We have tried through diplomatic means to protect the interests of our own missionaries and we shall continue to do so.
What of the deeper problems which lie behind this revolt? There has been some suggestion that it has been organised from outside the territory with the assistance of other countries. There is no doubt that organisations of Angolans in the Congo have played their part. There are indications that one of the organisations has received support from other countries. But it is unrealistic, in the Government's view, to treat what is going on in Angola as if it were entirely a drive by others outside the country and did not bear relevance to the aspirations of the Angolans themselves.

Mr. Stan Awbery: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that it is the general opinion of nearly all the missionaries who have come from Angola, and who are in this country at present, that no assistance has come from outside and that there is no Communist influence at all behind the rising in Angola? Will the right hon. Gentleman take note of what the missionaries have said, as well as of what the Portuguese Government have said?

Mr. Heath: Yes, I have taken note of both those points. As I have said, there is some evidence, but, on the other hand, it is unrealistic to believe that it is entirely a matter of help from outside. This is part of a movement of militant African nationalism which is spreading across the whole of the Continent. If this is the case, then it requires not only the restoration of law and order, but also remedies which are political and economic.
There are fundamental differences between our own policy and that of Portugal in Angola. This has been made clear on many occasions and, indeed, the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition himself has acknowledged

today that it is clear. It is nowhere clearer than in our own dependencies and in those countries which have moved towards self-government and have, indeed, achieved self-government over these past few years. In my view, there cannot be any doubt in the minds of Africans today what is the policy of Her Majesty's Government on moving towards self-development and self-government.
But the view of the right hon. Gentleman—and this is where I want to deal with his points—is that that policy has been compromised by some of the actions which have been carried out in these last few weeks, and that, of course, is where I differ from him. I should like to examine them. He cited seven different points and I will deal with a number of them. First, there is the voting at the United Nations. I think that he will agree, if he reads the record, that on each occasion the British delegate at the United Nations has made our view quire plain about events there. He has expressed understanding of the difficulties of Portugal and he has also explained our view about events there.
At the same time, on each occasion there has been a particular reason, which again he stated quite clearly, governing our voting. This, I think, tends to be quite often a fundamental difference between ourselves and the Opposition. It has been expressed, in the broad view of the right hon. Gentleman, that one should just take the general sense of a motion and vote for it without looking particularly closely at its contents.
We ourselves have taken the view that as this was not a matter which was a threat to peace and security—and that was our view when the matter first came before the Security Council—it did not justify support of the motion, although the right hon. Gentleman would have preferred us to have voted for it. Again, when it came before the Security Council and the Assembly there was the point of Resolution 1514. We did not support it when it came up for the first time because we did not believe that it was in accordance with the colonial policy of either the Opposition when they were in power or ourselves over the last ten years.
My noble Friend has made it plain that wherever this resolution appears we


will ignore it, because we have already expressed our complete disapproval of it. On each occasion there has been a particular reason which governed our voting, and, at the same time, we expressed our opinion and our policy.
Then there have been the visits of the Fleet and the Portuguese Chief of Staff, and so on. The right hon. Gentleman said that he could not believe that this was coincidence, but I assure him that it is now part of the normal pattern of relations between ourselves and a great number of European countries. If he examines the programmes which have been carried out with Norway or Holland, for example, or with other European countries, he will find that there are many more exchanges of this kind than have been carried out with Portugal over the last few months.
The exchanges are arranged long in advance. We had to decide whether they should be cancelled. The fact that they were arranged was not a mark of a special move to secure friendship with Portugal, because that friendship is long-standing and can be taken for granted. If the right hon. Gentleman compares the programmes for the visits between this country and other countries, I am sure that he will accept that that is so.
Then there is the question of the sale of arms, to which the right hon. Gentleman devoted considerable attention. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced to the House the Government's policy on this issue. The export of arms to overseas territories of Portugal is now suspended and in deciding the supply of arms to Portugal direct we have to consider the reasonable requirements of Portugal as a member of N.A.T.O. I would have thought that it was apparent to the right hon. Gentleman that it was up to Her Majesty's Government to decide whether a particular order was a reasonable requirement, or whether it was something which would be more than was required for N.A.T.O. and could be passed on for use in overseas territories. That is an appropriate arrangement with which to deal with what is always a difficult problem.
The right hon. Gentleman went on to discuss the position of Portugal in N.A.T.O. It demonstrates the policy which Her Majesty's Government have

been carrying out, that we have been treating Portugal as a loyal member of N.A.T.O., while, at the same time, the Government have made clear their views about the events and happenings in Angola and how they should be handled. The right hon. Gentleman discussed the criteria of N.A.T.O. He was a very prominent member of the Labour Government which, in 1949, agreed to Portugal's admission to N.A.T.O. and he must, therefore, accept a situation which, so far as Portugal itself is concerned, has not changed.

Mr. J. Grimond: On the subject of arms to N.A.T.O., I understood the Prime Minister to say yesterday that we would supply Portugal only with a type of arm which would not be suitable for use in Angola. Is that the case, or do we understand that it is simply that if Portugal asks us for too many arms, we will get suspicious?

Mr. Heath: I have my right hon. Friend's words before me. I will check them and my hon. Friend the Minister of State will be able to tell the hon. Gentleman later. Type is obviously one of the factors which has to be taken into consideration when deciding whether a supply of arms is to meet a N.A.T.O. requirement. I think that that is what my right hon. Friend said.

Mr. Philip Noel-Baker: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether napalm bombs are regarded as suitable for use in Angola? Has he seen the evidence of Mr. Grenfell, who saw an attack by napalm on an Angolan village and saw the remains of the bomb with instructions written on it in English?

Mr. Heath: I have not seen that particular piece of evidence. We have received a letter from the Red Cross stating that it had heard of only one case of a casualty alleged to have been affected by napalm bombs, but that it had not been able to examine it for itself.

Mr. Hale: Mr. Hale rose—

Hon. Members: Sit down.

Mr. Speaker: If the right hon. Gentleman does not give way, the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) must not persist.

Mr. Heath: I have given way several times.

Mr. Hale: Mr. Hale rose—

Mr. Heath: No.

Mr. Hale: On a point of order. The right hon. Gentleman has been speaking for ten successive minutes about Portuguese territory as distinct from Portuguese colonial territory.

Mr. Speaker: I take it that the hon. Member for Oldham, West is addressing me on some point of order. If not, he is not entitled to be addressing me. I was wondering what it was.

Mr. Hale: I was venturing to seek your guidance, Mr. Speaker. As the whole of the last ten minutes has been devoted to a discussion of Portuguese territory, and as Dr. Salazar has made it clear that previous Portuguese colonial territory—[HON. MEMBERS: "Speech."] —is now Portuguese metropolitan territory and as—

Mr. Speaker: Order. There is great difficulty about the practice of rising on points of order and gaining entitlement to use the time of the House on that ground, and then referring to matters which are not points of order. I hope that the hon. Member will tell me what his point of order is.

Mr. Hale: I seek your guidance, Mr. Speaker, on what is an extremely important point of order. Assuming that in a debate on a matter of this importance we proceed upon a complete misapprehension on the part of the right hon. Gentleman about the geographical limitations of those who are concerned, is it not possible for an hon. Member to say that Angola is part of N.A.T.O. through Dr. Salazar's own determination of what constitutes metropolitan Portugal?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member has been here a very long time and I would be surprised if he thought that that was a point of order. I am afraid that I do not think that it is.

Mr. Heath: I am fully aware of the constitutional position of Angola, but Angola is not covered by the N.A.T.O. Treaty.

Mr. Hale: It is part of metropolitan Portugal.

Mr. Heath: It is part of metropolitan Portugal, but it is not covered by the N.A.T.O. Treaty.
I have been describing the general position and the thesis that in order to deal with it a movement towards political, economic and social reform is necessary. We recognise that law and order have to be established in a territory of this kind and to be established by a means which is acceptable to nations at large. But, speaking from our own long experience, I think that the House will agree that military or police action alone is not enough and that progress in other directions is necessary.
My noble Friend the Foreign Secretary said this publicly in his speech at Lisbon on 25th May, 1961. He said:
What is necessary is a programme of social and economic advance which is seen by the people to be a reality and a political goal which rallies people to carry responsibility and inspires them with all that is good in patriotism".

Mr. Anthony Fell: Stop preaching.

Mr. Heath: That was a quotation from my noble Friend. He was able to discuss frankly with the Portuguese Government the situation in Angola and our views upon it.
Here, we differ from the right hon. Gentleman who feels that rather than discuss these matters with our friends and allies it is better to cancel any sort of visit and cut adrift from them. This is a difference of opinion which we must acknowledge. We believe that to help friends and allies in their difficulties it is better that we should have visits of this kind when matters can be frankly and openly yet privately discussed between them. We welcome indications which have been given at the United Nations by the Portuguese delegate, and by members of the Portuguese Government that they have in mind proposals for progress in housing, education and health.
It may well be that hon. Members will argue whether or not this is sufficient to meet the case, but, nevertheless, we welcome indications of progress in this direction. My noble Friend was able to discuss these matters fully and frankly. Indeed, that was the major purpose of his visit, and I believe that it was absolutely right for him to have


carried it out. These are matters for the Portuguese Government to decide, but we can best help in this difficult situation by maintaining our relations with Portugal as a N.A.T.O. ally and our connections with her in other ways and to keep with her our ancient friendship.
This, then, is really the crux of the matter for the House today. Our policies differ from those of Portugal in Angola. We greatly regret the events there. We deeply deplore loss of life at all times, and, as I have already said, no one can condone atrocities, no matter by whom they are committed.
We are sending our mission there to obtain more information. We hope that the United Nations sub-committee will be able to visit Angola and to see for itself. We have changed our policy as far as Resolution 1514 being contained in other resolutions of the United Nations is concerned, and we believe that the policy on arms which has been announced is the right one to follow in these circumstances.
We do not believe that we can improve the situation either for the Africans or for the Europeans in this continent by taking the view that Portugal ought in some way to be cut off from the comity of nations today. Far from it. We hope to see progress along the path of social, economic, and political reform in Angola, and, with the restoration of law and order, to see—

Mr. Fell: I am not clear about one point in my right hon. Friend's speech. Can he say whether we are responsible for the internal affairs of Portuguese territories?

Mr. Heath: I thought that I had made it plain throughout my speech that we had no direct responsibility, but that we were entitled, as a friend and ally, to try to help Portugal in this difficult period to the best of our ability, and that is what we are trying to do.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: Mr. Sydney Silverman (Nelson and Colne) rose—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Gordon Touche): Order. If the right hon. Gentleman does not give way, the hon. Member must resume his seat.

Mr. Silverman: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I have been here a long time, longer than the right hon. Gentleman, and I have never in my life seen such discourtesy. If the right hon. Gentleman does not want to give way, he should not give way, but he should not discriminate.

Mr. Heath: I have no desire to discriminate between the hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend, but I have given way to hon. Gentlemen apposite on many occasions in the course of my speech.
I have tried to explain the Government's position in this very difficult situation. We all recognise how grave and serious it is, and I believe that it is the wish of the House, as well as the wish of the Government, that we should do everything possible together with our Portuguese friends and allies to help to improve it.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Mr. Kenyon.

Mr. Silverman: Before the right hon. Gentleman sits down—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. I called the next speaker, Mr. Kenyon.

Mr. Silverman: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. It is an old custom in this House that if a speaker does not wish to be interrupted in the course of his speech he may be asked questions at the end of it before finally resuming his seat. That is what I am attempting to do. Is that out of order?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I would have allowed the hon. Member to ask his question if I had seen him, but I called the hon. Member for Chorley (Mr. Kenyon). Having called him, the Lord Privy's Seal's speech was at an end.

Mr. Silverman: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I wish to pursue this point, because there seems to be a misunderstanding about it. I am not disputing, and I would not think of disputing, your right to select the next speaker, but we had not reached the point of continuing the debate. The right hon. Gentleman was in the act of resuming his seat when I rose to ask him a question which I would have liked to have asked earlier, but which was at that time in order by the old established custom of the House. If you, too, wish to discriminate—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. The hon. Member must not make charges against the Chair.

4.35 p.m.

Mr. Clifford Kenyon: One of the difficulties which we are discussing on this occasion is the manner in which the Portuguese Government look at the question of what we consider to be colonies. Portugal has no colonies, and has never recognised as colonies the different parts of the world which she claims. She has always claimed that her colonies are provinces which are part and parcel of her country. If that is the case, then N.A.T.O. covers all the colonies or provinces as well as Portugal.
This is another African problem, the problem of many, and it is not a nationalist rising. It is the rising of a people against oppression in many forms which has continued over a long period. The great tragedy is that it need not have arisen. If steps had been taken both by the Portuguese Government and by other interested Governments in time to deal with it this situation would never have arisen. It could have been settled peacefully. It could have been settled without violence. But, because of the continued oppression and the over-ruling of the desires of the Angolan people, the problem has arisen in its present form.
I think that this has been due to the failure of many people who have known for years what has been taking place. As a Baptist, I lay considerable blame on the missionaries for not making known to the public much earlier than they have done what was taking place.

Mr. George Thomas: Surely my hon. Friend is aware that the missionaries had to weigh the consequences of being sent out if they spoke up, and also the fact that the African people were begging them to remain silent so that they could help them on the spot.

Mr. Kenyon: I am fully aware of all those things, but it is my opinion that where there is oppression of this nature of the scale on which it was taking place in Angola it should have been made public by the missionaries and those on the spot years ago.

Mr. Thomas: They have done it now.

Mr. Kenyon: They have done it, but it is too late.

Mr. S. Silverman: Not so late as the British Government.

Mr. Kenyon: It has also been due to the failure of the foreign service of the various Governments concerned who knew about this oppression and took no action. They have never taken action. They could have done something by approaching the Portuguese Government direct or they could have moved through the United Nations. This is another point which proves the ineffectiveness of the United Nations to operate quickly in these cases and the great need for that body to be reorganised.
Being now faced with this situation, what can we do? We have heard about the atrocities. There is ample proof of what has taken place. Atrocities have taken place on both sides. However great and however tragic may be the atrocities which the missionaries have disclosed, I have information from businessmen which outstrips completely the information which the missionaries have handed over.
We are entitled to expect Her Majesty's Government today to give us concrete proposals about what they intend to do. It is not sufficient to protest privately. The matter is now in the open. The whole world knows. Her Majesty's Government should make an open statement condemning what is taking place—it is taking place now—and stating that they are asking the Portuguese Government to stop the violence. The massacres are proceeding on both sides. From the information which I have, right up to date, I know that the massacres are still occurring. Can they end except in the extermination of one side? Something must be done; otherwise the bitterness which already exists, the bitterness of the African nation as a whole, will be intensified.
I know that the Foreign Office has the fullest information on the subject. Before the matter was raised in the House, I took one of the missionaries to the Foreign Office, as the right hon. Gentleman knows. There, with the Joint Under-Secretary of State, the position


was fully discussed and all the information available was put before him. I took with me the secretary of the African Department of the Baptist Missionary Society who had all the information from his people in the field.
What worries me is that, from that time, in the early part of May, nothing seems to have been done. The massacres have increased. They may be diminishing now, but after the date of our visit to the Foreign Office the trouble grew. We know that art that time there was the Portuguese plan of extermination. This also was put before the Joint Under-Secretary of State by my friend. Surely, there must have been representations of some sort to the Portuguese Government or to the Portuguese Ambassador. May we have information about that today? Have the Government taken that step and expressed in the strongest possible terms their feelings on the matter? We have heard nothing about it. Instead, there is the question of the soldiers, the sale of the ships and the sale of arms. All these things can only create in the minds of all Africans the suspicion that we are not opposed to what is taking place. It is the attitude of standing on the other side which is so frightening. If a child is drowning and an adult stands by and declines to act, he is condemned. The people of Angola are dying, and we decline to act. We are in just that position.
One of the most disquieting features of this century is that, with all our Christian civilisation of 2,000 years, more mass cruelty has taken place among civilised nations in this century than in any other century of history. It is frightening indeed. The most barbaric practices and cruelties ever committed by nations have been committed by those who have claimed to be and who still claim to be the most civilised. It is appalling. We condemn other nations for being under-developed, undereducated and barbaric, but we, the civilised nations, are guilty of the practices which we condemn in others.
When one considers the mass persecution by the powerful nations of people under their control, one feels that the civilising influence of science, education and even of religion cannot have gone very deep. Unless we as a leading nation

take a stand against these practices which are wrong and evil, the practices will not only continue but will increase. It is our duty as a nation, wherever we see these wrongs, to stand and speak against them and, wherever possible, to take action against them.
No one should know better than this Government that Africa cannot be ignored today either in part or in whole. It is inevitable that her people and races will become unified and take their place as members of the world comity of nations. The day will come when we shall have to reckon with Africa as a nation, not with Africans as races. Until that day comes, it remains the duty of the strong to protect the weak. Throughout the length and breadth of this country today, people are waiting for a declaration of action by Her Majesty's Government which will bring to a speedy end the strife now taking place in Angola.

4.47 p.m.

Sir Charles Mott-Radclyffe: The hon. Member for Chorley (Mr. Kenyon) had addressed the House with great force and sincerity which we all recognise and admire. I hope he will forgive me if I do not follow him stage by stage in his remarks. Many hon. Members on both sides wish to take part in this very restricted debate.
The subject we are debating falls really into two parts. The first is the horror which we all feel, wherever we sit in the House, at the events which have taken place in Angola. The second part is the question: what can we do about it? I think that there is much more agreement between the two sides on the first part than there is on the second.
I agree with my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal that massacres and mutilations are horrible, irrespective of the colour of the victims. I will go further than that and say that while this House is quite entitled, and ought in many ways, to raise its voice in protest, wherever these atrocities occur, I think it has real force behind it only if its sincerity can be judged by its consistency. When I listened to the speech of the Leader of the Opposition, I began to wonder exactly how consistent his protests were, and how consistent was his criticism of the Government. I am not at all certain by what yardstick the


Opposition at any particular moment assess the volume of their protests on massacres and mutilations and horrible events of this kind. Is the yardstick to be the number of the victims involved? Or the nature of the atrocity?
If the yardstick is to be based upon the number of the victims involved, I do not recollect—and I have been in this House for some time—any great volume of protest in 1947 from the Socialist Party when I million Moslems and Hindus were slaughtered in the inter-communal riots that followed the transfer of power in India. I should also like to remind the party opposite that their reactions to the no less horrible events—torture, rape and murder—both in connection with Mau Mau and over the Congo, were very much less vociferous than the reaction which they have shown us today. [HoN. MEMBERS: "Shame."]
When it comes to what we can do about it, I also find that the Opposition have chosen a line of delightfully frank discrimination. Her Majesty's Government are under pressure to impose various sanctions in one form or another against Portugal. One hon. Member opposite, at Question Time the other day, asked whether the Government were proposing to expel Portugal from N.A.T.O. Was any proposal ever made to expel the Soviet Union from the United Nations after the events in Budapest? The party opposite continued to press for the inclusion of Red China in the Security Council long after the invasion of Tibet, when heaven knows how many thousands of Tibetans were slaughtered. I find all this line of argument rather inconsistent, and it diminishes the sincerity and force of the protests which the party opposite makes.
It seems to me that there is to be one rule of conduct for one of the smaller N.A.T.O. Powers, and another rule of conduct for the larger world Powers whether inside or outside U.N.O. Or can it be that some special licence is to be given to terrorists if a terrorist organisation is in some way, directly or indirectly connected with what is called an independence movement?
As my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal said, Portuguese colonial policy is very different from our own. We think that ours is much better, and we should like to use our influence on

the Portuguese to persuade them to adopt what we would call a more liberal Colonial policy. The remarks that came from the Leader of the Opposition this afternoon are extremely unlikely to have that desired effect upon the Portuguese Government. Foreign Governments are sometimes favourably receptive to persuasion, but their reactions are never favourable to lectures from Left-wing parties, whether in this country or anywhere else.
I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend that the best way in which we can influence friends and allies to adopt a policy more in keeping with our own is not to overdo criticism in matters for which we have no direct responsibility, but to use our influence as a friend and ally, both behind the scenes and to a certain extent in public, to show them what damage they might be doing to the world situation and what damage they might well cause to the general cohesion of the N.A.T.O. alliance. That is a far better and a mare statesmanlike way of trying to influence the Portuguese than the line proposed this afternoon by the party opposite.

4.58 p.m.

Mr. Elwyn Jones: It is most regrettable that the hon. Member for Windsor (Sir C. Mott-Radclyffe) has so misrepresented the attitude of this side of the House on acts of atrocity and violence wherever they may be committed. We stand for a humanitarian tradition on this side of the House, and I hope that hon. Gentlemen opposite do likewise. In this House we vigorously condemned the Mau Mau atrocities, as that descent to bestiality should have been condemned.
I detected in the speech of the hon. Gentleman condonation of the Portuguese Government rather than condemnation, and if that is the attitude of a friend to one who is grievously in error, it is certainly not the attitude of hon. and right hon. Members on this side of the House. More regrettable than the speech of the hon. Member for Windsor was the muted manner in which the Lord Privy Seal condemned this vicious and cruel counter-attack for which the Portuguese authorities are now responsible. It is one thing when racial tempers, angers and hatreds get out of control, but we are faced here after an initial regrettable series of terrorist acts,


with Governmentally inspired actions, and massacres on a very large scale—actions for which the Portuguese Government themselves are responsible.
What I rose to say was that I confess that I was surprised during the speech of the Lord Privy Seal to hear him say that until February of this year all was quiet in Angola. I had the experience of going to Angola last year for the International Commission of Jurists to attend a treason trial there. I suppose that it was only mere coincidence that the trial was adjourned on the day I arrived, and that it took place some time later. In the trial, in the course of last year, there were in the dock not only Africans, not only assimilados, but Portuguese, who found intolerable the conditions of political oppression, exploitation and enforced labour in Angola. These facts are notorious. We do not want to send a mission of investigation and inquiry there. The British Consul in Angola knows the facts perfectly well, and we are now engaged in a massive delaying action on the part of the British Government, ostensibly in the name of seeking information, when the information is only too well known.
I remember in the course of that visit to Angola speaking to some of the counsel defending these Angolan Opposition politicians of all parties and all colours—Europeans, Africans and assimilados. These lawyers told me that each of their clients had been tortured. I saw the Deputy-Governor of Angola, and he assured me that full facilities for their defence would be provided. He did it with great charm, I must say, but what happened, in fact, was that leading counsel from Portugal who was to conduct the defence was refused permission to go by the Portuguese Government. That was the nature of the acceptance of the rule of law by the Portuguese authorities in Portugal and in Angola.
When there is condemnation of these acts of violence in Angola, as we on this side of the House condemn them, let it be remembered that, where we have political oppression in a community, where men have no opportunity for lawful protest, men of spirit and courage will fight, and they will fight with arms, if necessary, to assert their rights.
Therefore, it is not surprising that after decades of demand for political rights

and denials of the most elementary political rights there should be a flare-up in this period of great change in Africa. The wind of change in Africa is blowing not only through the British Colonial Territories. It is also blowing fast and strong in Portuguese territories where there has always been a far greater denial of human rights than in British territories.

Mr. F. M. Bennett: I am sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman does not intend to give the impression which I at any rate have gained from his remarks. He said, quite rightly, that brave men can be driven by oppression to fight with arms. Surely that does not excuse what has clearly been happening—I do not think anybody denies it—which is the ruthless torture and slaughter of women and small children? That cannot come under the heading of brave men fighting against oppression.

Mr. Elwyn Jones: I thought that the hon. Member was in the Chamber when I began my speech, because I made it clear that we on this side condemn atrocities. The conditions which exist in this Portuguese colony inevitably result in the kind of atrocity which may well have taken place in individual cases. We certainly condemn those acts. Equally to be condemned is a régime which gives no opportunity for the expression of criticism. This opportunity is denied not only in Angola. It is denied in Portugal. That is the grim reality of the situation. Portuguese colonialism is at the moment not only the most reactionary colonialism but also the most impoverished and, for that reason, perhaps the most violent.
I confess to a feeling of great disappointment at the speech of the Lord Privy Seal. This is a moment in history when what Britain does and stands for in Africa is of critical importance. I have just been on a journey to West Africa, where our standing and reputation are high. We are making a notable contribution to the evolution of these people towards self-government, with proper standards and observance of the rule of law. This Government's association with the acts of the Portuguese Government in recent months has been One of the most regrettable phases in British diplomacy.

5.3 p.m.

Mr. R. J. Maxwell-Hyslop: I want to make only a few brief points, because it is important that our remarks should be constructive and be related to the situation in Angola. The basic problem in Angola is fundamentally an economic one. Where standards of living are extremely low, violence of all kinds thrives, whether it is political, criminal, or any other form of violence. The problem to which we should address ourselves, if we are concerned with conditions in Angola, is how we can assist in improving those conditions. We must come to the conclusion that an injection of capital into Angola, and indeed into domestic Portugal, is essential to the establishment of the economic conditions on which any form of political democracy could thrive.
I cannot think of any country which enjoys miserable economic conditions in which the political systems of which we approve also thrive. A desperately low standard of living and liberal political institutions do not go together. It is important that we address ourselves to this question, because although indignation is a very warming emotion, and perhaps a very natural one, if the party against whom we direct it feels that our indignation is selective he is unlikely to be open to any offers of advice or assistance we may chose to make.
It might occur to the Portuguese Government that the policy followed by the Indian Government towards the Nagas, a Christian minority in India, has not been condemned by the British. So far as I know, what the Indian Government have been doing has not met with widespread and prolonged indignation in the House of Commons, although the suppression of the Nagas has been conducted for a number of years, using armaments supplied by Britain among other countries. The indignation which many of us feel today might well be thought by the Portuguese Government to be unduly selective. If it is unduly selective, our desire not merely to have a nice warm feeling but to render real assistance to people of all races in Angola will be purposeless.
How are we to raise the capital for an economic injection into Angola? When we think in terms of money, either domestically or internationally, the first thing we normally think of is that some-

body else should pay it. In terms of domestic taxation, we think of those taxes we do not personally pay. In terms of a shortage of capital in another country, we normally address ourselves to the World Bank, because we know that a high proportion of its capital is not subscribed by us.
If we conclude that we are otherwise unlikely, even with the best will in the world, which may not be there, to see a radical and substantial improvement in political conditions in Angola, Mozambique and domestic Portugal, among many other countries in the world, we must address ourselves to the question of what proportion of our national income we can afford to devote to the injection of capital into underdeveloped countries. This would not be too wide a subject to merit some discussion in this debate, because it is not very often aired in the House. I should value any suggestions which hon. Members on either side may care to make as to how we can raise the standard of living and provide more opportunities for gainful employment in the underdeveloped countries, of which Angola is one.

Mr. Walter Monslow: If we spent less money on nonproductive and destructive things and more on productive things and social services, we could meet the bill.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: I agree with the hon. Member absolutely, but the question which services are non-productive is a point of difference between him and me. I suspect that he has in mind defence expenditure. I consider that money spent on defence, which enables people to live in a degree of security which is essential to a liberal and democratic system like ours, is a very necessary expenditure on a very necessary service. When countries are insecure, either because they are afraid of attack from abroad or because they are afraid of the collapse of their own economies, they turn to political violence, either actual or formal in the sense that their constitutions do not embrace much liberty of expression. I hope very much that the debate will not entirely follow the course of expressions of indignation, however natural those expressions might be, but will take a more constructive form.

5.9 p.m.

Mr. Stan Awbery: I shall not follow the hon Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop), because the greater part of his speech was irrelevant to this subject. I listened carefully and attentively to the Lord Privy Seal's speech. I have come to the conclusion that, whatever we say today about Angola, the Government will not move. A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still. The Government are not prepared to listen to any argument which may be put forward to assist the people of Angola. The Lord Privy Seal is prepared to listen to the Portuguese Government. He made a number of quotations from articles in this morning's Press which evidently emanated from the Portuguese Government in justification of what they are doing in Angola.
Why do not the Government and the Minister turn their attention to people nearer home? There are people in this country who can give them all the information they require about the position in Angola. We are sending out a consul-general. Why? It is to see what is going on in Angola. As if we did not know! We did not send any such commissioner to Kuwait, because oil interests were involved. We send one to Angola because only human beings are concerned.
Millions of our people are deeply moved and deeply concerned about what is happening in Angola. They have not been so deeply moved since the Congo atrocities under King Leopold in the early days of this century.

Mr. Paul Williams: Is the hon. Member going to refer to the Congo atrocities which took place while the United Nations was there?

Mr. Awbery: I did not mention that.

Mr. Williams: Why not?

Mr. Awbery: I am speaking of the atrocities committed at the beginning of this century when the Congolese failed to bring in their taxes on rubber. In those days a hand or a foot was cut off as a punishment, and all in the name of a civilised nation. The Baptists, the Methodists and members of all Churches in this country were deeply moved then,

and they took action. They are deeply moved today at what is going on. These men are here now. They have witnessed the atrocities and the shooting, and they are prepared to testify on oath to the atrocities being perpetrated in Angola, not by the rebels but by the Portuguese troops against the people. No less than 8,000 Angolans have been killed, against 1,000 Portuguese. They tell us that the heads of the chiefs of tribes are being cut off and placed on poles. The Bantu tribe is being wiped out by the action of the Portuguese soldiers. Mass executions of men and women are taking place.
This is the evidence of people in whom I have more confidence than I have in the Portuguese Government. I am prepared to accept the witness of men and women who have given thirty or forty years of their life in order to build up a civilisation in that country. The burning of homes in the forest is well known. The people to whom those homes belonged now have nowhere to go. These are the things that stir up nations more than self-interest. Money stirs up some people, but others are stirred up because of their feelings for the people who are suffering. In Angola one side has the deadly weapons while the other has nothing.
At Question Time in the last week or so the Government have agreed that these atrocities are taking place and that thousands have been slaughtered. They have agreed that refugees are flocking from Angola into the Congo. They have agreed that inhuman acts are being committed by soldiers and other people in Angola. They have agreed about all those things, but when we ask them to do something about it they search around for reasons why nothing should be done. What do they say? They say, "We are not responsible", or "We cannot interfere with the internal affairs of another nation." We have heard that one before. They say, "We are carrying out the obligations of N.A.T.O. and the United Nations." Is it an obligation of N.A.T.O. and the United Nations to cease helping people who are being persecuted and prosecuted, as they are in Angola? If it is, let us get out of N.A.T.O. and the United Nations. I am convinced that the attitude of the United Nations is quite the opposite, and that if we gave it a chance


to go in and do something it could find a solution to the problem.
We have heard it said that it is not our business. That remark has been made before. Pontius Pilate said, "Take him away. I have nothing to do with this man and I wash my hands clean." Washing the hands does not remove the guilt. Suffering humanity, wherever it may be, is the business of hon. Members opposite as well as on this side, and we should have regard to it. We rushed into Kuwait. Why did we not wait and then send a consul-general or a governor-general to hold an inquiry? It was because the situation there is bound up with finance and oil. In Angola, however, there are merely human beings, and because of that we are prepared to turn a blind eye on what is happening.
There is no doubt that there is a deep stirring in the minds and hearts of the Angolans. They are not satisfied to go on being governed by the Portuguese, any more than our Colonies were prepared to go on being governed by us. We have written some very fine pages in colonial history—but we have also written some bad ones. The people of the Colonies will remember the black ones when they have forgotten the white ones. In Angola we are writing one of the black pages. The people need help, and we ought to help them.
It has been suggested that the Communists are behind the trouble. The word "Communists" is not used. Reference is made to "an outside source", but the inference is there. Our missionaries say emphatically that there are no outside sources. This is an inside urge.
By their actions in Angola the Portuguese are creating a fertile soil for the development of Communism, and I predict that if it goes on Communism will take not only Angola but all Africa—

Mr. S. Silverman: Why not, if that is democracy?

Mr. Awbery: The Portuguese are anxious to stop Communists entering Angola, but they themselves are preparing the soil for Communism, and if they go on it will lead to the whole of Africa becoming Communist. We condemn apartheid, but what is going on in Angola is ten times worse. If we want to prevent the growth of Communism

we must create a better system, and the people will accept it.
If Communism is the better system, they will take it. If ours is a better social democracy they will come to us. The time is more than ripe when we should tell the world where we stand. We have deplored the atrocities, but that is all. If we can send troops and tanks and guns to Kuwait, surely we can do something to help the Angolese.
One of our darkest blots has been referred to this afternoon; we refused to agree to a U.N. inquiry. The Prime Minister said last week that he was determined not to budge on Berlin—

Mr. Geoffrey Wilson: Was I right in understanding the hon. Gentleman to suggest that we should send arms to help the Angolese?

Mr. Awbery: The Government are agreeing that our arms will be used in Angola from Portgual—

Mr. Wilson: But is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that we should send arms to those who are fighting the Portuguese?

Mr. Awbery: I did not say anything at all about sending arms. I will speak about arms in a moment.
The Prime Minister says that he will not budge on Berlin, and in a speech that he has made today he has apparently said that we shall not budge in our attitude towards Angola. Is that what we think about the human rights of these suffering people?
Portugal is our friend. Portugal is a member of N.A.T.O., just as we are, and she is a member of the U.N. If a friend is committing a crime it is friendly to warn him of the consequences. It is not unfriendly to condemn the wrongful actions of a friend, and that is what we ought to do. If Portugal is a great friend of ours, and has been for 300 years or more, we should tell her of the great agitation there is in Great Britain over these atrocities in Angola, and seek to set up an impartial inquiry.
Can we not ask Portugal to let a few people from Britain go out to see the position for themselves? If Portugal is our friend, we should ask her to do that, and she should agree. Cannot we say to our friend, "You are committing crimes and we shall dissociate ourselves


from them even if it ends our friendship"? We are told by the Government Front Bench that we do not condone the action in Angola. If we do not condone it, why do we not condemn it—

Mr. John Biggs-Davison: I thought that the hon. Gentleman proposed an impartial inquiry, but what would be the good of an impartial inquiry if we proceeded at once to condemnation?

Mr. Awbery: I should be prepared to accept the findings of an impartial inquiry made by people in whom we have full confidence, but I am not prepared to accept the report of a committee that is biased one way or the other—

Mr. P. Williams: Then why condemn now?

Mr. Awbery: Because we have had direct evidence from men and women who have seen these atrocities committed. I have not seen these actions myself, but I am prepared to accept what those men and women say.
We should refuse to sell any arms of any kind to Portugal until these crimes stop. We should tell the Portuguese that the great urge among their colonials in Angola cannot be suppressed by force of arms. We know that from our own experience. We tried in Cyprus and in other Colonies; we failed, and we came to agreement. We should advise Portugal to learn from our experience, and tell her that if she wants to retain our friendship she must stop the atrocities at once. We should warn her, "If your actions in Angola lead to war, we are not prepared to take part in it". That would help the Portuguese to come to their senses.
For the Government to sympathise with the Angolese and not to help, is infamous. If there is something wrong, we must help to put it right. The Government have shown apathy and indifference towards the crimes in Angola. They must be shaken out of that apathy, and this is one of the ways of doing it. I say to the Churches, which have done a good deal to create a public opinion, "Carry on with your agitation. Justice must prevail. Right must triumph over wrong. Helpless, defenceless, exposed people are looking to you, the Churches." And I think that they are looking to us for some help to stop what is going on.
This is a great emergency, and people must be forgiven if they show more than usual emotion and zeal in putting up the case for these people. The Government must act in this matter. If they do not, they must give a reason for not acting. I close with four lines of a hymn that was written 140 years ago and which is sung in thousands of churches by millions of people:
Can we whose souls are lighted with wisdom from on high,
Shall we to men benighted the light of life deny.

5.30 p.m.

Sir Henry Studholme: My right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal replied, I thought, with wisdom and moderation to the points raised by the Leader of the Opposition. I hope that his speech will help this House and the country to take a balanced view of events in Angola. I am afraid that I cannot say the same of the speech to which we have just listened from the hon. Member for Bristol, Central (Mr. Awbery). I thought that it was unhelpful and that a great deal of it was irrelevant.
Most of the criticism in the Press and in Parliament so far has been directed against the measures taken by the Portuguese to repress the rebellion in Angola. Portuguese troops are accused of horrible atrocities and the Portuguese Government of a policy of genocide. Very little has been said, except by way of passing reference, by those who attack the Portuguese, about what happened in March when the trouble started. Little has been said about the thousand Portuguese farmers and their families, to say nothing of the large numbers of loyal Africans, who were suddenly murdered in the most ghastly manner.
It is small wonder, however much one may deplore reprisals, if in their terror and fury these Portuguese civilians carried out such reprisals. The first duty now of the Portuguese Government—as, indeed, it would be our first duty if we were in the same position—is to restore law and order, and stern measures are necessary for that. [HON. MEMBERS: "Really."] I rarely bore the House with a speech, and if hon. Members will allow me to get on with what I am saying they may have a chance of catching the eye of the Chair later in the debate.
After all, a war is going on in Angola. War is a beastly business, but I shall


want more evidence before I believe all these accusations of atrocities of which the Portuguese are accused, and the sooner our commission of inquiry can report on what is actually happening in North Angola the better. From information corning in there is evidence, as my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal said, that the rebellion has been partly engineered by people outside playing on the grievances of the Africans in Angola. I do not deny that they may have some very serious grievances, but I would never say that they were of such a nature as to condone the horrible things done in March.
I am not going to criticise the Portuguese colonial system. It is quite different from our colonial system. It is based on paternalism and assimilation and is a much slower process. In Goa where the Portuguese system has been developing for 400 years it has proved to be highly successful, and the people there consider themselves to be Portuguese and do not wish to be anything else. What may seem right to a Latin may not appeal to an Anglo-Saxon and vice versa.
We may not agree with the Portuguese system, and we can only hope that our colonial system in Africa may be proved by events to be right. To hear many hon. Members opposite talk one would think that all the Portuguese are horrible, brutal people. They are nothing of the kind. They are a kindly and humane people. The British, too, are kindly and humane, and nothing enrages us more than to hear stories of cruelty and oppression. But I beseech hon. Members opposite to be fair.
Living in this peaceful, well ordered and, more or less, civilised country of ours, few, people have the slightest idea of conditions in Africa, in many parts of which it is only a short time since primitive savagery gave place to semi-civilisation. To people outside, some of us may appear to be sanctimonious. How many of those who talk disparagingly of the Portuguese far what is going on in Angola would talk in the same way if they had seen their women folk raped and mutilated, their children murdered and their heads stuck on stakes?
Fear is a bad counsellor. Violence leads to violence and revenge drives out reason. What is happening in Angola is tragic and deplorable, but we must realise that without strong measures law and order cannot be restored and peaceful people, both Africans and Europeans, protected. I believe that instead of reviling the Portuguese we ought to encourage them in their efforts to establish law and order and then, once they have done that, to act in a magnanimous way. If disorder triumphs, ruin and chaos will descend on Angola and might well spread far beyond its boundaries.

5.37 p.m.

Mr. Donald Wade: During and after the uprising in Hungary I recollect the attempts made by Communists and some friends of Russia to justify—I am not suggesting that this applies to any hon. Member of this House—and explain away what occurred in Hungary on the ground that it was a revolt which Russia could not afford to allow to continue. It was said that Russia must restore law and order, that the revolt had been incited from outside and that, anyway, things just as dreadful happened elsewhere in the world. I do not believe that anything that was then said could excuse what was a barbarous and unforgivable action on the part of Russia at that time.
As this sad story of Angola has unfolded I have detected in some quarters a similar tendency on the part of those who do not want to offend Portugal to try to minimise the seriousness of what has happened. After reading all that I can find, and after hearing all the evidence that I can obtain, I do not believe that we are justified in remaining silent about the appalling and inexcusable atrocities committed in Angola.
This morning, I had a conversation with a lady missionary. She asked to remain anonymous because a near relative of hers is still in Angola, and I must respect her request. She has been working in a district in Angola where the Africans are peace loving and have taken no part in the revolt and where no white man has been killed. She told me of a sad incident, where two planes came over and machine gunned two peaceful villages and then dropped bombs on them. I am bound to accept


her evidence. That cannot be explained away on the ground that this was a case of white settlers arming themselves in protection against attack.
No one denies that there has been a revolt in the northern part of Angola. I personally accept the view that it was probably organised, although to suggest that it was organised by international Communism is to create a completely untrue picture. What happened probably was that Africans who had left the territory because they could not endure the conditions there organised this attempt to liberate their country.
I think that there is a further reason —the difference of view about Angola as a territory. The Africans regard it as their homeland and the Portuguese regard it as part of Portugal. That, I believe, has created a head-on clash. I recognise the fact that there has been a revolt, and I do not attempt to justify the atrocities. None of the missionaries to whom I have spoken has attempted to justify the atrocities that have been perpetrated. The Baptist missionaries have frankly admitted that there has been violence on both sides. I quote from their statement of 4th July:
We deeply deplore the murder of women and children and we do not approve of violence as a proper method of settling disputes between races or nations: but we hold firmly to the opinion that the repression of Africans in Angola (no less than the repression of all opposition parties in Portugal itself) has prevented all possibility of the redress of grievances through constitutional means.

Mr. Norman Pannell: Has the hon. Gentleman seen the publication The Facts about Angola, issued by the Baptist Church on 19th June, which, referring to atrocities committed against Europeans, said:
Pregnant women were ripped open. Small children had their limbs cut off and fed to the dogs. The atrocities have been terrible.
Does not the hon. Gentleman think that, if this is not a justification, then it is some excuse for what happened later?

Mr. Wade: I have already said that I am aware of the atrocities. I have read the document to which the hon. Gentleman has referred. The Baptist Missionary Society has been frank and open about this business. But one cannot excuse the machine gunning of peaceful villages.
The statement of 4th July went on:
Africans have constantly urged upon us that we should not risk expulsion or the refusal of re-entry visas by public denunciation of the ills they suffer…
Eventually, it became clear that the only thing to do was to speak out openly. That is what they have done.
To get a complete picture, we must look into the background, into the underlying causes. Why did this come about? The past history of Portugal in Africa is not a happy story. I shall not go back as far as the slave trade, but will consider more recent times.
The country of Angola is 481,000 square miles—several times the size of Portugal. The population consists of 4½ million black Africans and about 110,000 whites. The Portuguese have been in Angola for nearly 500 years, yet only one in 300 of the Africans is an assimilado, which is one-third of 1 per cent. One cannot talk about a multiracial society in those conditions.
Education is practically non-existent, except for the children of the Portuguese. The Portuguese Government spends only 1 per cent. of revenue on education, compared with 10 per cent. in most African countries. Most of the education of Africans is provided by the missionaries.
But the most serious cause of unrest is the working conditions. All this was in existence long before February, 1961. Although slavery has been abolished, for many Africans freedom is no better. Slaves were treated as assets to be cared for, but some of the employers care little for the health and working conditions of those who are working under forced labour. I quote again from the Baptist statement:
The vast majority of Africans have borne conditions hardly removed from slavery.
If we are seeking for causes, we must look at the combination of forced labour, brutality and appalling conditions. I have here a detailed account of this and numerous quotations. I shall spare the House many more of them, however. Many hon. Members may have read these reports. They make tragic and sad reading.
I refer now only to contract labour, because this needs mentioning. The statement says:
When the Government or a Private Enterprise is short of cheap labour in Angola,


application is made to an official who is in charge of 'contract labour'. This official sends to the chief of a village for the necessary men. If the Chief fails to provide the men he is liable to be beaten."
I asked the lady missionary about that today. I said to her, "Have you seen this happen?" I was told, "Yes. We have seen these chiefs who have been beaten because they could not provide the necessary men." And yet that is not called slavery.
I make now a final quotation from the Baptist missionary statement.
The Portuguese military authorities have acted against the African population with the utmost barbarism …. At Sanga, jeeps arriving with troops in mufti, told the villagers that the struggle had been won. When a crowd had gathered the soldiers opened fire with machine guns.
At Tumbi, a loudspeaker car was used to draw a crowd. When the crowd had gathered troops converged on the village and killed 300.
At Tomboco, mothers with children were stood on one side, all the men, boys and women without children were then shot.
I believe that great credit is due to the British Council of Churches. I believe that this is a moral issue and that it was right for the Churches to raise it. I believe that it is the wish of the Churches that this should be lifted out of party politics. This is not a party matter, but a serious moral issue. We are told that we must not condemn what has happened until we have had an impartial report, but if these reports which we have had are one-sided why has there been such reluctance on the part of the Portuguese Government to admit observers? Why has there been censorship?
The Times, of 11th February last, had a report that
Four foreign correspondents, from the Daily Express, the Guardian, I.T.V., and N.B.C., were expelled from Angola on 10th February, when they had inquired after a colleague who was reported shot by a Portuguese officer.
Why this censorship, and why are protests in Portugal itself suppressed? I know a Portuguese gentleman, Professor Pires, who was able to come to this country some time ago, when I had the pleasure of meeting him. He is a Liberal. He is 70 years old. He was due shortly to retire from his position as lecturer and examiner at St. Antonio's Hospital, Oporto. He was a member of the former Republican Party.
Professor Pires and his colleagues have been campaigning, I admit, against Portugal's policy in Angola and in favour of civil liberty and human rights. At the time of the Foreign Secretary's recent visit to Lisbon, Professor Pires and his friends organised a Press conference in the hope of informing the British people of the views of the Portuguese who do not agree with what is going on in Angola.
What was the result? Immediately Lord Home left the country, Professor Pires was arrested by the secret police on 6th June. No reason or warrant was produced. He was taken away without even being able to collect his personal belongings. At the time he was recovering from an attack of pneumonia. His wife was not allowed to see him, but was informed that he had been taken to prison in Lisbon. I understand that he is still in prison and that his case has been taken up by an organisation known as "Appeal for Amnesty". That organisation has written to the Portuguese Ambassador, but has had no reply.
This gentleman was not a Communist or a dangerous revolutionary, unless it is said that anyone holding Liberal views is dangerous in a country with the sort of régime that exists in Portugal. He was merely disturbed about what his country was doing and anxious that Britain should not do anything to lend its support to those activities. It is difficult to think of anything comparable with this case in this country, but suppose that the Secretary of State of the United States came to Britain at a time when the Government was carrying out a policy of which a section of this country disapproved. Let us, for supposition, say that Lord Beveridge and one or two friends called a Press conference to protest and they were immediately thrown into gaol without a trial. I should not be surprised, in those circumstances, if protests were forthcoming from our friends in the United States and from other sources.
Surely, therefore, we are similarly entitled to protest at what is happening in Portugal. I appreciate that we are constantly being told that Portugal is one of our oldest allies. The people of Portugal may be our oldest friends, but that does not necessarily mean that the present Government in Portugal is our


oldest ally. Many of the people in that country do not know what is happening, and if they did they probably would not approve.
Very serious is the fact that the action of the British Government has given the appearance of condoning the illiberal—to use a comparatively mild word—actions in Angola. People do not read all these complicated explanations about why Britain abstains. They only know that Britain is sending ships or troops and her action is regarded as a form of condonation. Let us remember that the struggle in the world is not just a struggle between two great Power blocs, but an ideological struggle. If we appear to be so anxious to make friends with countries that are carrying out these illiberal policies, we shall lose that struggle. In taking that action we are not helping to strengthen N.A.T.O. We are not helping the Commonwealth; we are damaging it. Before this debate comes to an end I hope that hon. Members will be given a much clearer exposition about what the Government is doing about arms.
I hope that Her Majesty's Government will make it clear that they are in favour of an impartial inquiry and that they do not in any way support what Portugal is doing in Angola. Unless that is made abundantly clear I have no doubt that ere long we shall deeply regret it.

5.55 p.m.

Sir Cyril Black: I found myself in very considerable agreement with the earlier part of the speech of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Huddersfield, West (Mr. Wade), but I think that it is quite unfair, for reasons that I shall show, to suggest that anything that Her Majesty's Government have done can be regarded as condoning the conditions to which the hon. Gentleman referred. It has been made clear that the Government in no way condone—and no British Government would—the kind of conditions which the hon. Gentleman and other hon Members have described.
I am glad of this opportunity of intervening in the debate because, as many hon. Members know, I have been a member of the Baptist Church for many years and Angola is a country in which

Baptists have a long and honourable record and with which they have a special concern, a concern equal to that possessed by any other Christian body. I must make it clear that in what I am about to say I am naturally voicing my own opinions and not necessarily the views of the Baptist Church, although I hope that I may say some things which may find approval on the part of many Baptists.
No one can read the reports of the Angola missionaries of the Baptist Missionary Society without being impressed at the gravity of conditions in Angola and I do not think, whatever may be said about our lack of information, that there can be any serious doubt about the serious character of the situation there. My conviction is that the missionaries who have returned from Angola have stated their case with a scrupulous regard for fairness. They have endeavoured to make it clear that they in no way condone the actions of the insurrectionists, whose insurrection was used as the pretext for what has since happened, and they have throughout endeavoured to take a non-partisan attitude in regard to this matter.
Their concern is, naturally, both for the worldly and for the spiritual wellbeing of the territory in which they have worked and ministered for so long, and I feel sure that hon. Members on both sides would wish to identify themselves with an expression of sympathy for those who, after, in some cases, a lifetime of zealous and sacrificial service, have seen most of the results of their labours dissipated as a result of what has happened.
I must say a word here about what I believe to be the attitude of the Churches on this matter, because a good deal of reference has been made to the concern of the Churches and, about that concern, there can be no doubt at all. I am bound, in fairness, to make the point that a good many hon. Members opposite have had a lot to say by way of condemnation of the Government—and I do not quarrel with them over that, for that, no doubt, represents their point of view and it is only right that they should state it—but it would be wrong for the impression to go out from the House, as a result of this debate, that the official Church bodies have taken one side or the other on our Government's actions in this matter.

Mr. Walter Monslow: As the hon. Gentleman is a practising Christian, will he say which side he thinks he should take?

Sir C. Black: If the hon. Gentleman will allow me to make my speech in my own way I will make my attitude perfectly clear on this matter.
I think that it is fair that I should make this point, because it is right to get on the record the fact that neither in the resolution passed by the Baptist Union Assembly, a few weeks ago, nor in the memorandum of the Baptist Missionary Society, nor in the more recent resolution of the Executive Committee of the World Council of Churches—to which reference has been made—is there one word of criticism of what has been done by this Government in this matter.

Mr. G. Thomas: The hon. Gentleman will be as aware, as I and all hon. Members are aware, that the high-powered deputation from the British Council of Churches which waited upon the Foreign Secretary and the Minister of State last week went there not because of what Her Majesty's Government had done, but because of what they had not done. The British Council of Churches left the Government in no doubt at all that they were deeply disturbed both by abstentions—and the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—but also by the lack of condemnation.

Sir C. Black: I have read the reports of that deputation and I have discussed with a certain member of the deputation what took place. Of course, I accept that the purpose of the deputation was to impress upon the Government the grave concern felt by Churches throughout the world about conditions in Angola. I am not for one moment suggesting anything contrary to that. What I am saying is that there is all the difference in the world between, on the one hand, expressing concern about conditions in a country in which something analogous to a civil war is taking place and, on the other, expressing a partisan view in regard to what the actions, or, if hon. Members like, the inactions, of our Government have been.
It is right to make the point that in the Baptist Union resolution, the Baptist Missionary Society memorandum and the

World Council of Churches resolution there is not a word of criticism of the British Government's actions. [Interruption.] That is the point. Hon. Members may disagree with the line that the Churches have taken. I am not arguing that. I am simply saying, so that we may get the facts right, that the Churches have not adopted with regard to our Government a partisan attitude as was inferred by some hon. Members.
I come now to the point with which we are really concerned this afternoon, and that is what we ought to do in the present tragic situation which confronts Angola. I do not for one moment agree with the view which has been falsely attributed to the Conservative Party, that we ought not to criticise the Portuguese authorities in Angola because Portugal is a N.A.T.O. Power and our oldest ally. I believe that it would be quite wrong for us to abstain from condemnation of Portugal for any reason of expediency of that kind. I accept that absolutely, without any reservation at all.
However, apart from expediency, I believe that from the standpoint of what we want to achieve in Angola, it is at least arguable whether the policy which has been advocated this afternoon by some hon. Members is more likely to secure the results that we have in view than the policy which the British Government have pursued and are pursuing.
I believe that some of the critics of the Government have been very unfair in what they have said. In this respect, I should like to refer to three points. First, the criticism was made that the Foreign Secretary's visit to Lisbon towards the end of May might be regarded in Portugal, in this country and elsewhere as being somehow a condonation of what Portugal was doing in Angola. If it had been only a private visit and nothing else was associated with it, I suppose it could be argued that that conclusion could fairly be drawn. But that is not the case.
I heard about these difficulties in Angola through Baptist sources about a week before the Foreign Secretary's visit to Lisbon. I took an immediate opportunity of discussing the matter with the Lord Privy Seal. I expressed to him the concern that the Baptist Churches felt in regard to this matter, a concern which I was quite certain would be widespread


among the Churches and in the nation as soon as the facts became known. I asked the Lord Privy Seal whether the Foreign Secretary would take the opportunity of making known to the Portuguese Government in Lisbon, in an emphatic and unmistakable way, the concern about Angola that we felt in this country. I received an encouraging reply from my right hon. Friend that that would be done.
Not only was that done, as the Foreign Secretary himself stated publicly in another place, but on 25th May, the Foreign Secretary, I understand, made a public speech in Portugal in which he emphasised, as spokesman for this country, the need for the adoption of more liberal policies both in Portugal's home territory and in Portugal's territory in Angola. So if it be the fact, as it is, that the Foreign Secretary made that clear to the Portuguese Government and in a public speech to the Portuguese people, how his visit to Portugal could be regarded as condoning events in Angola completely passes my understanding.
The point has been made from the other side of the House—it is a most contradictory one—that there is no need to send observers to Angola because we already know the facts and, therefore, it would be merely a delaying matter to send observers. Yet, at the same time, the Government are blamed for abstaining, for a reason which has been explained, from voting in the United Nations on the resolution to send United Nations' observers. If we know the facts already and there is no need to send observers to ascertain them, why is there so much value apparently in observers going from the United Nations to find out what we know already and no value at all in our own observers being sent? One may argue one or other of those propositions, but one cannot argue both of them at the same time.

Sir Robert Grimston: Socialists can.

Mr. Tom Driberg: Would the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black) agree that it is equally contradictory for the Lord Privy Seal to say, as he did last week, that the British Consul-General has been in Luanda all the time and has been sending us reports

and information all the time, and also to say, as he did today, that we have no means of obtaining information?

Sir C. Black: I think that I can leave my right hon. Friend to deal with that point. I should have thought that it was very difficult for our Consul-General in Luanda, who may be subject—I know not, but I think it is probable—to all kinds of restrictions on travel which would impede him in the performance of his duties. If that be so, and if he be Consul-General at a centre many miles away from the scene of the trouble, it seems to me that it would be difficult for him to supply us with much information from the actual battlefront.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Has my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black) any evidence that our Consul-General is subject to any restrictions not required by security and military considerations?

Sir C. Black: What the reasons are I do not know. I merely suggested that, like a great many other people, his right to move about the country would probably be curtailed.
The third point that I want to make is that it has been suggested that somehow or other we ought to try to cold-shoulder Portugal out of the N.A.T.O. Alliance, that because N.A.T.O. exists to serve a democratic purpose, Portugal, not being a democratic country, is not a fitting partner in the N.A.T.O. Alliance. That point has been made rather unfairly by hon. Members opposite.
I would point out that Portugal and this country were signatories at the same time to the N.A.T.O. Treaty in 1949 when, as my right hon. Friend has pointed out, the Labour Government signed it on behalf of this country, and in 1949 the Salazar régime was in power in Portugal and had been for a number of years. It was certainly no more of a liberal régime in 1949 than it is now. Therefore, if we are at fault in having Portugal as a N.A.T.O. partner it is not a matter on which any party point can be made by hon. Members opposite, because it is a situation for which both sides of the House have an equal measure of responsibility.
Before concluding, I wish to make three points to the Government. First, I should like to impress upon my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal the


importance, which is reinforced by the debate in the House today and by the rising tide of apprehension in the country about Angola, of the need to keep in continual touch with the Portuguese Government and to exercise the utmost possible influence upon them to bring to an end at the earliest possible moment the fighting and the killing which are taking place there.
Where I disagree with some who have spoken earlier in the debate is as to the way in which we are most likely to influence the Portuguese Government. My experience has been that if on an important matter one wants to influence somebody with whom one has hitherto been on friendly relations, it is not always wise as an introduction to start by calling the man a liar, a blackguard and a rogue, and then, having created an unfavourable and an unfriendly attitude, to endeavour to exercise an influence on him to do what one wants.
My experience has been that the best way to influence people is to keep open the channels of communication with them, to avoid appearing to take a too partisan attitude towards them, but in one's efforts to influence them to leave them in no doubt how strongly one feels on the matter on which one wants to influence them and how great one's concern is. The Lord Privy Seal should make it quite clear to the House that we will continue to exercise the greatest possible pressure through the channels available to us.
Secondly, I should like the Minister of State to say whether consultations have taken place between us and the Governments of the other N.A.T.O. Powers with a view to all the other N.A.T.O. Powers making united and joint representations to the Portuguese Government on this matter. Leaving aside Portugal, there are thirteen other States in the N.A.T.O. alliance. I should like to know whether we have had consultations with them about this matter, whether there have been any discussions on concerted action and, if not, whether consideration might not be given to taking action along that line.
My third and final point is the question of what we are doing to bring practical help and assistance in their distress to the vast number of refugees who have fled from Angola into the Congo, who

have been variously estimated as being between 80,000 and 100,000 in number. I understand that the United Nations Agency which is dealing with this matter has adequate funds to alleviate the present distress. If, however, we reach the point, as we may well do soon, that those funds have been exhausted, what are we doing in conjunction with other nations to leave the United Nations Agency there in no doubt that all the money that is reasonably needed will be available for the relief of distress? We have a great duty in that respect and we ought to make it clear that we will not be mean in our approach to this part of the problem.
We all appreciate, I am sure, that this is just the kind of issue on which people feel strongly and on which it is right that they should feel strongly. It is not only necessary that people should feel strongly. It is also necessary that they should act wisely. Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman once said:
sometimes the function of the wise is to repair the harm done by the good.
It may well be that that has relevance to the matter that we are debating today. By all means, let us have warm hearts on an issue of this kind, but, at the same time, let us keep cool heads.

6.15 p.m.

Mr. J. J. Mendelson: The hon. Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black) has made a great deal of the important point concerning the attitude of the Council of Churches in its representations to the Government, but it would not be treating this issue with the seriousness that it deserves to leave it where the hon. Member left it. One of the main reasons why I was anxious to take part in this debate is because I wanted, briefly, to give voice to the representations that I and, I am sure, most hon. Members have received from the representatives of the Churches.
I have no exaggerated opinion that my contribution is particularly needed in this debate, but I am anxious to represent, as I have been urged to do, the views of those who have been deeply stirred by these events. In complete contradiction to what the hon. Member for Wimbledon has just said, I should like to quote from one of many letters which I have received. It is signed by more than 30


people and is dated 21st June from the Vicarage, Stocksbridge near Sheffield. It states:
Dear Sir, We, the undersigned, from Stocksbridge, deplore the repression by the Portuguese authorities in Angola; and we deplore also the lack of concern of Her Majesty's Government to make forceful representation to the Portuguese Government. As your constituents, we urge you to bring the matter up in the House immediately.… Those who signed were present at two meetings, representing different bodies of various church denominations in the area.

Mr. Norman Dodds: Is my hon. Friend surprised to know that I have had four similar messages from church gatherings in my constituency? Does not the fact that messages of a similar nature have been received from a number of different areas suggest that the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black) is out of touch with the views of the churchgoers?

Sir C. Black: I never suggested in my speech that there were not individual churchmen or bodies of churchmen who held particular views on this matter; of course there are. What I said, and what is unassailable, is that the official church bodies have not expressed themselves in criticism.

Mr. Driberg: Yes they have.

Mr. Speaker: We had better recover same order in the debate.

Mr. Mendelson: I expected the hon. Member for Wimbledon to make that intervention.
I should like now to quote from a letter from the Baptist Missionary Society, received only today. Speaking not for a few individuals but on behalf of the society, it states:
The present crisis, however, forces us to break silence, first because the retaliatory measures on which the Portuguese Government are now engaged border on genocide; and secondly, because Africans themselves have made the specific request to us that the time for silence is past.
I should like the Minister who replies for the Government to give an account of the meeting that has taken place between the deputation from the Council of Churches, the Foreign Secretary and the Lord Privy Seal. If any element of dispute remains after what I have said,

it is for the Government to clarify the matter. I am confident that if any account is given we shall be told, as some of us already know, that representations implying serious criticism of the conduct of the Government were made by that deputation.
I now turn to the speech of the Lord Privy Seal. No one, I am sure, will dissent from the first point that he made, namely, that this is a debate of great importance and that no hon. Member would wish to say anything which would make the situation more difficult. But that does not absolve us from the duty to speak the truth, and it is very important that that should be realised throughout a debate of this kind. Secondly, I am sure that the tragic events in Angola have put the Government in a very difficult situation. It is obvious that any Government, of whatever party, would be in a difficult situation. But being in a difficult situation does not excuse making the kind of case which the Lord Privy Seal made this afternoon.
The right hon. Gentleman started much too late in giving the history of these events. Hon. Members have pointed out—and the right hon. Gentleman must be aware of this—that the real history of this matter began long before 1st February this year. It is clear that if we start at that point we do not get a very clear picture of the situation. In evidence of that, I think that there is respectable opinion to hand beyond the organisations which have been quoted. There is an account in The Guardian, today which the Lord Privy Seal must have seen, from one of the most reliable Scandinavian correspondents. He writes for one of the most respected papers in Scandinavia. He gives the pre-history as well as the details. I have not sufficient time to quote from this account, but it refutes the implication in the Lord Privy Seal's speech that nothing serious which ought to be mentioned happened before 4th February.
I turn to the Lord Privy Seal's point about the attitude of the Government in the United Nations to these events. He said that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition had taken the view that, if there are some words or sentences in a resolution with which the Government do not agree, they ought to vote for the resolution just the same.


That was not a fair representation of what my right hon. Friend said. If the Lord Privy Seal reads my right hon. Friend's speech tomorrow, he will see that he made a completely different point from that which the Lord Privy Seal thought he made. I wish to repeat it because it goes to the root of the matter.
It is possible and not beyond the capability of the representative of Her Majesty's Government at the United Nations to make clear in many ways that we do not approve of every word and every sentence in a resolution and at the same time to come down on the right side when the voting takes place. What the Lord Privy Seal told the House and the country today was something quite different. It may be fairly summed up in this way. On a resolution of this importance before the United Nations he instructs the British representative to speak in the right direction and then to vote in the wrong direction. If one abstains in a matter of this kind, one as much casts a vote as if one votes against the resolution.
It was a sorry spectacle—and that is why so many people have written to us about this matter—to see our representative at the United Nations not being associated from the very first moment with the condemnation of the policy being pursued in Portuguese Angola. I go further. I am not one of those who believe that the influence of Britain in the counsels of the nation has deteriorated as much as some people assume. Had the Government taken a strong stand in the United Nations from the start we should have had earlier action on behalf of the Portuguese Government in allowing a committee of inquiry to enter Angola.
It has been said again and again in the Portuguese Press—and the Lord Privy Seal must be well aware of this; he sees more reports of the Portuguese Press than I am able to see and has reports from the Embassy staff all the time—that the attitude of the Portuguese Government is not regarded by the British Government—sometimes the reference in many leading articles in the Portuguese Press was not to the Government but to Britain—as being in disagreement with the principles of the United Nations. That is an argument which we helped to supply to the people

who wrote these articles in the Portuguese Press.
I now wish to deal with the equally important matter of what the Lord Privy Seal said about N.A.T.O. and Portugal. This was mentioned when we discussed the possibility of the 19th Brigade Group carrying out a military exercise in Portugal. It would have been much better if the announcement that the 19th Brigade Group was not to have this exercise at this time had been made at the end of the debate that we had and not left for some days afterwards. However, the point which the right hon. Gentleman made about N.A.T.O. is one which needs clarification. Many of us are firmly convinced that this country must be a member of a defensive alliance. Many of us have the task and duty to defend this belief in the country, to discuss it with our constituents and to argue with those who do not take the same view. In this, I do not merely include members of the Government and leaders of the Labour Party. I say deliberately that it is the job of all Members of Parliament to take this view. It is most essential that it should be clearly recognised up and down the country that we must have a defensive alliance which is in defence of our national interests and of democracy at one and the same time. It is very important that the Government should at no time give the impression that they do not believe in that themselves.
Here I should like to turn to those hon. Members who have made it appear as though the point about N.A.T.O. and the ideas behind a defensive alliance are not serious matters. It is very important that we should accept as a simple fact of the present situation that the Government's conduct in the last four months has given the impression, not only to people in Portugal—and that matters a great deal—but to all sorts of members of the United Nations that, first, we are holding back in trying to do our utmost to get the United Nations involved in the Angola situation, and, second, that we are hesitating in pronouncing our disapproval of what the Portuguese Government have done.
The Lord Privy Seal gave us a very interesting piece of information this afternoon about the visit of the Foreign


Secretary to Portugal. He said that the Foreign Secretary went to Portugal mainly to discuss the situation in Angola. If that was the main purpose of his visit, then the Government should have abstained from any other action in any other sphere—under the Ministry of Defence or any other Government Department—which weakened the hands of the Government if they wanted to intervene. If we could not expect the Foreign Secretary on the day of his arrival in Lisbon to give a Press conference condemning the Portuguese Government's action, Her Majesty's Government should have surrounded his visit by such declarations in the United Nations and elsewhere which made it clear that the Foreign Secretary was not going to Portugal to approve the policy pursued by the Portuguese Government. The Government have failed to do that.
It would be wrong of the Government to underestimate the strength of feeling which has developed in this country about this matter. It is to the great honour of our people that so many of them, of all parties and of no political party, have been deeply stirred by these events. As hon. Members know, we have had difficulty in getting this debate arranged. There was unreasonable reluctance on the part of the Government to agree that it should be held immediately, as they should have done. But we were able to get the debate in the end because the Government knew that in this matter we speak for the vast majority of this nation.

6.30 p.m.

Mr. Denis Healey: The House this afternoon has been debating one of the great issues of our time. It is a human tragedy on an appalling scale. Tens of thousands of men and women and little children—white as well as black—have been killed like cattle in the last few months in Angola and hundreds of thousands have been forced from their homes into another country by fear or hunger.
It is not only a human tragedy, it is also a major political tragedy, a tragedy even greater than that of the Congo. I suggest that in a sense it is a tragedy of the most classical type, a tragedy of pride, because at the root of the trouble in Angola at present is the complacency

—thick as a rhinoceros's hide—which the Portuguese Government have shown over policy in Angola during the past fifty years at least and, in particular, during the last ten years; an absolute certainty shown throughout all the moving history of nationalist revolution in Africa that, "It can't happen here."
It is remarkable to reflect that, even now, President Salazar, who has been occupying supreme power in Angola for over thirty years, has never once visited Angola. We all know that the Portuguese Government have absolutely refused, even in principle, to recognise that Angola might ever become self-governing. They have absolutely refused in principle and practice to accept the fact which we must all accept these days of African nationalism. I cannot help feeling that even ten years ago Portugal might have moved in time to prevent the tragedy which now confronts us all. Instead of that, she allowed a flood of poor Portuguese immigrants to go to Angola. She attempted to retreat from assimilation, tightening the screw just at the moment when all over Africa people were beginning to realise, reluctantly or not, that the wind of change was irresistible.
It is not surprising, particularly in view of what happened in the neighbouring territory of the Congo, that, finally, the situation in Angola exploded with the terrible consequences we know. I only hope that others still in Africa, other white communities, will recognise the lesson of the situation in Angola because, if they do not, the tragedy we now see in Angola might be repeated in the next five, ten or fifteen years in South Africa, or even in Rhodesia.
I think that the key to the difference between the Opposition and the Government in this debate—and I regret that, in a sense, it has become a party disagreement, for I am sure that there are some hon. Members opposite who feel the same as we do and would have expressed themselves very much as we have today—is that we recognise that the Angolan situation is having a traumatic effect on feeling and opinion throughout the continents of Africa and Asia. We must accept the fact that for those in Africa and Asia who have heard what is happening now in Angola it is something as important and as terrible


as what we used to hear about in Europe under Hitler, fifteen years ago. If half the stories which have come out of Angola through missionary sources are true, of crimes committed by the Portuguese authorities there, they are essentially the same in nature as those for which Eichmann is now being tried in Jerusalem.
That, as the Lord Privy Seal knows very well, is not an exaggeration. In a situation like this, in which we have the Angola tragedy with its repercussions throughout the world, the attitude of Her Majesty's Government is one of the greatest possible importance. None of us on this side of the House denies that the Lord Privy Seal and other members of the Government have a human concern for the tragedies which have occurred in Angola in the last few months. We do not accuse them of indifference, but we accuse them of a lack of imagination and sensitivity. We accuse them—as Dr. Payne, presenting the position of the British Council of Churches, did when he spoke to the Foreign Secretary—of a grave misjudgment of the situation which is fatal in the modern world. We accuse them, arising out of this insensitivity and lack of imagination, of showing a false sense of political priorities in the way they have conducted themselves throughout this unhappy business.
I cannot help feeling that the Lord Privy Seal in his speech this afternoon was a perfect example of the weakness in our Government. The prim, bureaucratic approach which he adopted towards this problem was exactly what we complain about in the conduct of the Government as a whole. There was the total failure to appreciate the conditions which produced the events in Angola which started with the African rising in February. The picture that he drew of the recent history of Angola was a superb example of the age-old Conservative theory of history in which riots and revolutions arrive unexpected out of a blue sky and usually as a result of foreign agitation.
There was a total failure to appreciate that when men kill other men, women and little children—as undoubtedly some of these African terrorists did in February—they do so because they are reacting to a whole com-

plex of social, political and economic circumstances. Unless we can understand the basic social and economic conditions which have produced those terrible events we shall have no hope whatever of escaping from them.

Mr. Heath: I think that the hon. Member is being less than fair. If he listened to the whole of my speech he would know that in my introductory remarks I said that from the point of view of disturbance Angola was quiet until the particular disturbances in Luanda on 4th and 5th February and I went on to cite two particular cases. In a speech in a short debate of this kind one could not go over the whole colonial policy of Portugal. I specifically said that there were disagreements about colonial policy. The second part of my speech I devoted almost entirely to the thesis that what is at stake is not "outside interference" but the wave of nationalism in Africa today. That is what has to be dealt with in Angola.

Mr. Healey: I do not think that anyone who listened, as I did, to the speech of the Lord Privy Seal will feel that the summary he has given represents the background of the speech. What I complain of is that never once did he refer to the main root of the problem, the system of forced labour which has been going on for fifty years and which has meant that half a million people have been working every year under guns and whips for a few shillings a week. I complain that the Lord Privy Seal did not deem it even worth while to refer once in the whole of his speech to that system of forced labour. That, to my mind, was a very good example of the basic lack of sensitivity which the Government have shown in dealing with this problem.
The fact that we must face as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for West Ham, South (Mr. Elwyn Jones) said, in a very impressive speech, is that the Africans have had no possible escape from those terrible conditions except through violence. I could not help feeling that the whole of the speech of the Lord Privy Seal was in a sense an apologia for the behaviour of the Portuguese Government during the last few months. I do not deny that one could detect some signs of discomfort, but they were


quickly suppressed and offset by consistent twisting of facts in favour of the Portuguese authorities.
I will give one or two examples. The right hon. Gentleman gave the impression that the only atrocities in Angola were those by Portuguese civilians outside Government control in the weeks immediately following the African rising. He must know that that is not true. He knows perfectly well that from the moment of the rising Portuguese troops came in and the Africans were systematically terrorised, there was imprisonment and killing of Africans and the taking of hostages and the burning of villages. These facts led to the mass exodus of 100,000 people to the Congo.
The right hon. Gentleman suggested that the Portuguese Government have condemned the reprisals carried out by civilians. I cannot find a single example of such condemnation and nor could he when he was questioned. What we have found is that two months after the rising took place there was a statement by the Portuguese Army Minister when saying farewell to young Portuguese recruits going to Angola:
We are going to fight savages. We are going to fight wild beasts, wild beasts who are not Portuguese because they obey orders from international Communism. We are face to face with terrorists who have to be fought as one fights wild beasts …
It is no good the right hon. Gentleman trying to ride off on the pretence that this was an irresponsible remark by an unknown civilian. It is characteristic of the official policy of the Portuguese Government throughout the emergency.
Yet meanwhile, with these terrible things happening in Angola, the Lord Privy Seal seems to think it quite right that our relations with Portugal should go on as if nothing was happening in Angola at all. He justified the call of the British warships as falling into what he called the "normal pattern of visits". Cannot he really see that this is not a normal situation and that for the whole normal pattern of visits to proceed in this situation is to give a completely false impression of the attitude of the British Government and people? His whole approach to this matter and the approach of the Government is one of "business as usual"—business in more senses than one.

Mr. Heath: While the hon. Gentleman continues to distort my speech I must continue to interrupt him. I was dealing with the point made by the right hon. Gentleman and saying that these things were purely coincidental, which was something he seemed to find difficulty about accepting. I pointed out that this was part of the normal pattern of arrangements and had been arranged long before. The question was whether we should cancel it.

Mr. Healey: The Lord Privy Seal has demonstrated once again his total failure to recognise the point which Her Majesty's Opposition is making and which has been made again and again by the British Council of Churches. We say that these visits should have been cancelled. We have said that again and again in the House. It is the insistence of the Government to act as if nothing had happened in Angola that we are castigating.
The Lord Privy Seal went on to say in his speech this afternoon that the Government intended to continue to supply Portugal with its "reasonable N.A.T.O. requirements" in armaments. How do they decide what is reasonable in a situation in which almost the whole of the Portuguese Army is not manning the N.A.T.O. front in Europe, but is in Angola carrying out this policy of repression?
The right hon. Gentleman seemed to suggest that there was some type of weapon which was good for killing Russians, and this we would provide for the Portuguese, and that there were other types which were only good for killing Africans. Is the right hon. Gentleman telling us that we have not sent to Portugal in the last few months—and are not still sending—bullets which could be used to kill Africans just as easily as to kill Russians—and are being used now to kill Africans? The Government have set a precedent by giving details of British arms shipments once before in recent history, as the right hon. Gentleman was reminded at Question Time today. He would be doing a great deal to ease the disquiet in this country if he would give details of our arms shipments which are going to Portugal at the present time. Until he gives those details we shall continue to believe that the British Government are supplying


Portugal with the arms which Portugal is using to kill Africans in Angola.
It is perfectly true that the Government have made a few modifications in their policy in the last few weeks. But, again, the complaint which one must make is that all these modifications of policy have been furtive and surreptitious which has robbed them of all political or moral meaning. I dare say that perhaps we intend to go on delaying indefinitely the refitting of the two frigates, or, at any rate, so long as the Angola crisis persists. I dare say—indeed, I fervently hope—that we have not only postponed the military exercise in Portugal, but have cancelled it. If this be the case, let the Government say so. If it is not the case, do not let the Government pretend to the people of this country and to the world, that they are in any way modifying their policy towards Portugal because of what is happening in Angola.
The trouble about the present policy of the Government is that we have given not only the world a false impression of our attitude. We have given Portugal a false impression of our attitude. I referred earlier to the complacency with which the Portuguese Government have approached the problem in Angola over the last fifty years. There is no way of puncturing that complacency without speaking plainly and forthrightly in public as, in fact, the Prime Minister spoke in South Africa to the South African Government about the wind of change. We are asking that the Government should speak plainly in the same spirit to the Portuguese Government about Angola, because the way in which Her Majesty's Government are behaving at present is deeply discouraging to those people, and they do exist in Portugal, who are working for a change in Portuguese policy in Angola.
I cannot help feeling that the fulsome hypocrisy of the remarks of the Foreign Secretary in Lisbon must have been profoundly discouraging to the 73 Portuguese democrats who recently published a letter condemning the régime. The refusal of a visa to Captain Galvao, a man who risked the loss of his job to fight this policy, must have discouraged anybody else who might have attempted to follow the lead which Captain Galvao gave.
All we get from the Lord Privy Seal is a lot of prating about an ancient alliance, the Portuguese alliance. He often forgets that the alliance lapsed during the Second World War, at a time when perhaps we might have needed it most. I suggest to the Lord Privy Seal that it is no use talking about what happened in the fourteenth century. The Government does far too much of that. We must look to the future and not at the past.
Mr. Spaak and Lord Montgomery have both said—rightly, in my view—that the basic problem facing the West today is the problem of winning the confidence of the African and Asian peoples. This is where the Government's policy over Angola, and its lack of imagination and false sense of priorities, is doing us irreparable damage. We think that their conduct regarding the Portuguese policy is not only discouraging the forces working for a change of policy inside Portugal; it is not only undermining support for N.A.T.O. throughout Europe where it is needed most, it is also smudging the image of Britain throughout the world.
I hope that the Minister of State will show some sign that the Government appreciates the deep concern felt on this issue by the overwhelming majority of the British people. Since the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black) referred to the British Council of Churches, I think that I cannot do better than to quote the words of Dr. Payne when he spoke to the Foreign Secretary the other day. What he said we on this side of the House believe profoundly and sincerely:
We believe that the voice of Britain should be very clearly heard on this issue and that if it is not we shall forfeit the already shaken confidence of the African peoples and have failed in the humanity and compassion which, as a Christian nation, we profess.

6.47 p.m.

The Minister of State, Foreign Office (Mr. J. B. Godber): We have had a fairly short debate on this important subject and I shall not have time to deal with all the points which have been raised. I will seek to cover as many as I can.
I think that the hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) was a little unfair to my right hon. Friend in some of the comments which he made. I shall seek to touch on some of those aspects


of his speech during my remarks. It seems to me that in replying to this the Government should lump together certain criticisms which have been made. The points made by the Opposition appear to fall into several fairly well-defined categories. The first is criticism of Portugal's colonial policy in general and, incidentally, of her form of government at home as well. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition made a point of that in his speech. The second criticism is of the harsh and vindictive repression carried on in North Angola. Thirdly, there is the criticism of Britain for not denouncing both Portuguese policy and Portuguese repression. And, fourthly, there is criticism of Britain—[HON. MEMBERS: "The Government."]—of Her Majesty's Government for continuing with their N.A.T.O. obligations to Portugal and for a number of visits by units of Her Majesty's Forces and by Ministers after the Angola tragedy had developed. Those are the four major categories into which the general criticisms fall. I will try to deal with them separately.
On the first point, that of criticism of Portugal's colonial policy, a number of hon. Members have implied that Her Majesty's Government have not made their position plain on this. I think that the best way in which I can deal with that point is to remind the House of what Ministers have said on this matter over the last two months. I should like, briefly, to quote one or two of the comments which have been made in this House. I will quote first a sentence from my own speech during the foreign affairs debate on 18th May. I said:
We regret the present difficulties, and do not disguise from the Portuguese Government that our colonial policy is quite different from theirS."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th May, 1961; Vol. 640, c. 1585.]
[Laughter.] That was what I said, and I would have thought it a clear indication that we do not agree with their policy.
In the same way, my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal said on 28th June:
As I have said to the House previously, we have made it plain that there is a difference between our policy and that of the Portuguese Government, that we deplore the loss of life and that we hope that law and order will soon be restored there …".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th June, 1961; Vol. 643, c. 437.]

That, again, is a clear indication. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Hon. Members may not like this. But it really is important that they should see exactly what has been said, because these are very clear expressions of view. They may not go as far as hon. Members opposite would wish us to go but they do indicate disapproval of these policies.
The Minister of Defence said:
We do not agree with Portugal's policy in Africa.… We have not condoned what is happening in Africa.… We have always made it plain, and I make it plain again now, that this does not imply that we agree in any sense with the colonial policy of the Portuguese."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th June, 1961; Vol. 642, c. 769–74.]

Mr. Healey: Would not the Minister of State complete this list of quotations by quoting the Foreign Secretary's words in Lisbon, that their doctrine, like ours, is based on respect for human personality and that we both reject racialism?

Mr. Godber: I was just going to quote my noble Friend, who said in another place last week:
Certainly neither I nor any other Minister of the Government has given any impression that we condone any policy which leads to atrocities."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, House of Lords, 26th June, 1961; Vol. 232, c. 811.]
Those statements make quite clear where we stand.
As has been said repeatedly here, too, that our colonial record is perfectly well known, and we do not believe that our policy is misjudged or misunderstood in Africa on this matter at all. We have made this abundantly clear and I would have thought there was no excuse whatever for saying that we have not made our position abundantly clear.
On the question of Portuguese repression at present being carried on in Angola, my right hon. Friend made it perfectly clear today that there is very great difficulty in getting the facts on this matter. A great deal of condemnation has been uttered this afternoon in this House by hon. Members opposite. I think it is necessary to remember that there have been other statements besides some of those they have quoted. I am sure hon. Members saw a letter in The Times which appeared only yesterday from Mr. Stanton who put a very different


complexion on the matter. I shall not read it all, but it says:
Innocent and unsuspecting, like most victims of terrorism, they were mutilated, disembowelled, hacked to pieces.
There was this provocation in the first place. Some hon. Members have admitted that, but at least we must remember that this was the position and that steps were taken by Portuguese civilians. There was also a statement in the Daily Telegraph yesterday which developed this point and pointed out the difficulty which the Portuguese authorities initially had in controlling the actions of their civilians, and that they have now improved this position.
I have a telegram here from the Consul-General in Luanda dated yesterday from which I will read a short portion:
I believe that the majority of the crimes committed by the Portuguese were the work of armed civilians and that far from condoning them the authorities did their best to stop them. In the earlier stages they were however prevented from taking effective action to that end partly from lack of sufficient police and troops and partly from fear of precipitating clashes between the white population and the security forces. With the arrival of reinforcements from Portugal the situation has greatly improved and there is little doubt that the army is having a good influence.
[Interruption.] This is a factual report from our representative in Angola and it is entitled to the respect of this House. He also said:
There is also a good deal of evidence that a large number of Africans have been and continue to be killed by rebels for refusing to join forces with them and for protecting their European masters' lives, families and property.

Mr. Driberg: I thought that the Consul-General was supposed not to know what was going on.

Mr. Godber: These things must be recognised. It is not wholly a one-sided matter.

Mr. Healey: Is it not the custom when Ministers quote from telegrams or State papers to publish the whole of the dispatches so that hon. Members may judge from their totality and not just pieces?

Mr. Speaker: I think that is not right. It has to be an official paper. I do not think that this is out of order.

Mr. Healey: It is official.

Mr. Godber: On the point which the hon. Member for Barking (Mr. Driberg) was on, I think he challenged my right hon. Friend for having said that we had no information today whereas last week he said we were receiving reports. In fact, the point was that we had no detailed information, first-hand information, from Northern Angola. These are the best reports he has been able to achieve in Luanda itself. And he is far nearer to the facts than we are here. He is shortly going to the northern areas and will himself have an opportunity of seeing. This is, in fact, the latest information we have from him and I thought it right to give it to the House.
On this whole question of information, I think it should be clear that the Government are not answerable for the Portuguese Government about their actions. Nor are the Portuguese obliged to give us detailed information about individual incidents or allegations which do not concern our nationals. We are, after all, dealing with a territory of which Portugal is the sovereign Power and we are just not in a position to make inquiries and investigations. I hope that when we get the report from the Consul-General, after he has visited the areas himself, we shall have a clearer picture of the general position.
I have already dealt with the question of criticism of Britain not answering for Portuguese policy. On the second aspect, that of Portuguese oppression, it is clear that we have no full picture. And the quotations I have given show how possibly one-sided is the general impression which the Opposition have painted. Of course we deplore needless killing or ruthless repression whenever they may occur. But we need to know much more about this matter.
On the other hand, we cannot say that the Portuguese forces have no right to take action to prevent Africans loyal to themselves from being butchered. While we believe that restoration of law and order can best be achieved in a climate brought about by the announcement of a programme of political advancement, we cannot deny the need to restore law and order. Any abdication of responsibility in this sphere by the Portuguese Government would lead to more bloodshed, not less.
I turn to the last of my categories, criticism of the Government for continuing their N.A.T.O. obligations and visits of forces to Portugal. My right hon. Friend has dealt with these already. I want only to remind the House of the main function of N.A.T.O. It is as an organisation of States in a defensive alliance for securing the members of that alliance against attack. The solidity of the N.A.T.O. Alliance is the bedrock of our defence policy. It may be argued that the resignation or expulsion of one small country from that alliance would not weaken it in any material way. I do not hold that view, quite apart from the fact that I think such a step would be quite unjustified.
No State has left N.A.T.O. since its inception. If the essential unity of the alliance were disrupted in this way it could have incalculable effects on its future solidarity and on the existing confidence between the member States.

Any such step, however small its military implications, could have the gravest political repercussions. It could have no possible effect on events in Angola. Certainly it could be a source of satisfaction behind the Iron Curtain. If Portugal, therefore, is a N.A.T.O. ally then we must continue to co-operate with her fully in all N.A.T.O. requirements.

In a brief summing up of a short debate like this it is possible only to deal with the major issues involved. Inevitably in a matter in witch emotions can readily become engaged, a number of sweeping statements have been made. I have sought to limit myself to the facts as they are known to us. And on the facts, for Government actions in this difficult matter I feel entitled to ask for the support of the House.

Question put, That this House do now adjourn:—

The House divided: Ayes 225, Noes 309.

Division No. 243.]
AYES
[7.0 p.m.


Abse, Leo
Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Jeger, George


Ainsley, William
Edwards, Walter (Stepney)
Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)


Albu, Austen
Evans, Albert
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Fitch, Alan
Jones, Rt. Hn. A. Creech(Wakefield)


Awbery, Stan
Fletcher, Eric
Jones, Dan (Burnley)


Bacon, Miss Alice
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, s.)


Baird, John
Forman, J. c.
Jones, Jack (Rotherham)


Baxter, William (Stirlingshire, W.)
Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)


Bence, Cyril
Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. Hugh
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)


Benson, Sir George
Galpern, Sir Myer
Kelley, Richard


Blyton, William
George, Lady Megan Lloyd (Crmrthn)
Kenyon, Clifford


Boardman, H.
Ginsburg, David
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.


Bowden, Herbert w. (Leics, S.W.)
Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. p. C.
King, Dr. Horace


Bowen, Roderic (Cardigan)
Gourlay, Harry
Lawson, George


Bowles, Frank
Greenwood, Anthony
Ledger, Ron


Boyden, James
Grey, Charles
Lee, Frederick (Newton)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)


Brockway, A. Fenner
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Lever, Harold (Cheetham)


Brown, Alan (Tottenham)
Griffiths, W. (Exchange)
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Grimond, J.
Lipton, Marcus


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Gunter, Ray
Loughlin, Charles


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson


Castle, Mrs. Barbara
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
McCann, John


Chapman, Donald
Hamilton, William (West Fife)
MacColl, James


Chetwynd, George
Hannan, William
Mclnnes, James


Cliffe, Michael
Hart, Mrs. Judith
McKay, John (Wallsend)


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Hayman, F. H.
Mackie, John (Enfield, East)


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Healey, Denis
McLeavy, Frank


Cronin, John
Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Rwly Regis)
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


Crosland, Anthony
Hill, J. (Midlothian)
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)


Crossman, R. H. S.
Hilton, A. V.
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)


Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Holman, Percy
Manuel, A. C.


Darling, George
Holt, Arthur
Mapp, Charles


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Houghton, Douglas
Marsh, Richard


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)
Mayhew, Christopher


Davies, Ifor (Gower)
Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Mellish, R. J.


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Mendelson, J. J.


Deer, George
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Milne, Edward J.


Delargy, Hugh
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Mitchison, G. R.


Diamond, John
Hunter, A. E.
Monslow, Walter


Dodds, Norman
Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Moody, A. S.


Donnelly, Desmond
Hynd, John (Attercliffe)
Morris, John


Driberg, Tom
Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Mort, D. L.


Dugdale, Rt. Hon. John
Irving, Sydney (Dartford)
Moyle, Arthur


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
Janner, Sir Barnett
Mulley, Frederick


Edelman, Maurice
Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas
Neal, Harold




Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip(Derby, S.)
Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.
Timmons, John


Oliver, G. H.
Short, Edward
Tomney, Frank


Oram, A. E.
Silverman, Julius (Aston)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Oswald, Thomas
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)
Wade, Donald


Owen, Will
Skeffington, Arthur
Wainwright, Edwin


Padley, W. E.
Slater, Mrs. Harriet (Stoke, N.)
Warbey, William


Paget, R. T.
Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)
Watkins, Tudor


Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W)
Small, William
Weitzman, David


Parkin, B. T.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)
Wells, Percy (Faversham)


Pavitt, Laurence
Snow, Julian
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Sorensen, R. W.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Peart, Frederick
Soskice, Ht. Hon. Sir Frank
Whitlock, William


Pentland, Norman
Spriggs, Leslie
Wigg, George


Plummer, Sir Leslie
Steele, Thomas
Wilcock, Group Capt. C. A. B.


Popplewell, Ernest
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)
Wilkins, W. A.


Prentice, R. E.
Stonehouse, John
Willey, Frederick


Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)
Stones, William
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Probert, Arthur
Strachey, Rt. Hon. John
Williams, Ll. (Abertillery)


Randall, Harry
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. H. (Vauxhall)
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Rankin, John
Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Reid, William
Swain, Thomas
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Reynolds, G. W.
Swingler, Stephen
Winterbottom, R. E.


Rhodes, H.
Symonds, J. B.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)
Woof, Robert


Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Taylor, John (West Lothian)
Wyatt, Woodrow


Robertson, John (Paisley)
Thomas, George (Cardiff, W.)
Yates, Victor (Ladywood)


Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)
Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)
Zilliacus, K.


Rogers, G. H. R. (Kensington, N.)
Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)



Ross, William
Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Royle, Charles (Salford, West)
Thornton, Ernest
Mr. Redhead and Dr. Broughton




NOES


Agnew, Sir Peter
Clarke, Brig. Terence(Portsmth, W.)
Gower, Raymond


Aitken, w. T.
Cleaver, Leonard
Grant, Rt. Hon. William


Allan, Robert (Paddington, S.)
Cole, Norman
Green, Alan


Allason, James
Cooke, Robert
Gresham Cooke, R.


Amery, Rt. Hon. Julian
Cooper, A. E.
Grimston, Sir Robert


Arbuthnot, John
Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.


Ashton, Sir Hubert
Cordle, John
Gurden, Harold


Atkins, Humphrey
Corfield, F. V.
Hall, John (Wycombe)


Balniel, Lord
Costain, A. P.
Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)


Barber, Anthony
Courtney, Cdr. Anthony
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.)


Barlow, Sir John
Craddock, Sir Beresford
Harris, Reader (Heston)


Barter, John
Critchley, Julian
Harrison, Brian (Maldon)


Batsford, Brian
Crowder, F. P.
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Cunningham, Knox
Harvie Anderson, Miss


Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton
Curran, Charles
Hastings, Stephen


Bell, Ronald
Currie, G. B. H.
Hay, John


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Dalkeith, Earl of
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel


Berkeley, Humphry
Dance, James
Heath, Rt. Hon. Edward


Bevins, Rt. Hon. Reginald
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Henderson, John (Cathcart)


Bidgood, John C.
Deedes, W. F.
Henderson-Stewart, Sir James


Biggs-Davison, John
de Ferranti, Basil
Hendry, Forbes


Bingham, R. M.
Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.
Hicks Beach, Maj. W.


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Doughty, Charles
Hiley, Joseph


Bishop, F. P.
Drayson, G. B.
Hill, Dr. Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton)


Black, Sir Cyril
du Cann, Edward
Hill, Mrs. Eveline (Wythenshawe)


Bossom, Clive
Duncan, Sir James
Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)


Bourne-Arton, A.
Eccles, Rt. Hon. Sir David
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount


Box, Donald
Eden, John
Hobson, John


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. John
Elliot, Capt. Waller (Carshalton)
Holland, Philip


Boyle, Sir Edward
Elliott, R.W. (Nwcstle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Hollingworth, John


Braine, Bernard
Emery, Peter
Hope, Rt. Hon. Lord John


Brewis, John
Errington, Sir Eric
Hopkins, Alan


Bromley-Davenport. Lt.-Col. Sir Walter
Erroll, Rt. Hon. F. J.
Hornby, R. P.


Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Patricia


Brooman-White, R.
Farr, John
Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)


Browne, Percy (Torrington)
Fell, Anthony
Howard, John (Southampton, Test)


Bryan, Paul
Finlay, Graeme
Hughes-Young, Michael


Buck, Antony
Fisher, Nigel
Hutchison, Michael Clark


Bullard, Denys
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Iremonger, T. L.


Bullus, Wing Commander Eric
Foster, John
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Burden, F. A.
Fraser, Hn. Hugh (Stafford &amp; Stone)
Jackson, John


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)
James, David


Butler, Rt. Hn. R. A. (Saffron Walden)
Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)


Campbell, Sir David (Belfast, S.)
Gammans, Lady
Jennings, J. C.


Campbell, Gordon (Moray &amp; Nairn)
Gardner, Edward
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)


Carr, Compton (Barons Court)
Gibson-Watt, David
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)


Carr, Robert (Mitcham)
Glover, Sir Douglas
Johnson Smith, Geoffrey


Cary, Sir Robert
Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)
Jones, Rt. Hn. Aubrey (Hall Green)


Channon, H. P. G.
Godber, J. B.
Joseph, Sir Keith


Chataway, Chistopher
Goodhart, Philip
Kaberry, Sir Donald


Chichester-Clark, R.
Goodhew, Victor
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Gough, Frederick
Kerr, Sir Hamilton







Kimball, Marcus
Nicholson, Sir Godfrey
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)


Lagden, Godfrey
Noble, Michael
Soames, Rt. Hon. Christopher


Lancaster, Col. C. G.
Nugent, Sir Richard
Spearman, Sir Alexander


Leather, E. H. C.
Oakshott, Sir Hendrie
Speir, Rupert


Leavey, J. A.
Orr-Ewing, C. Ian
Stevens, Geoffrey


Leburn, Gilmour
Osborn, John (Hallam)
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)
Storey, Sir Samuel


Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Page, John (Harrow, West)
Studholme, Sir Henry


Lilley, F. J. P.
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Summers, Sir Spencer (Aylesbury)


Lindsay, Martin
Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)
Sumner, Donald (Orpington)


Linstead, Sir Hugh
Partridge, E.
Tapsell, Peter


Litchfield, Capt. John
Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)


Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey (Sut'nC'dfield)
Peel, John
Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)


Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)
Percival, Ian
Taylor, W. J. (Bradford, N.)


Longbottom, Charles
Peyton, John
Teeling, William


Longden, Gilbert
pickthorn, Sir Kenneth
Temple, John M.


Loveys, Walter H.
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret


Low, Rt. Hon. Sir Toby
Pilkington, Sir Richard
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Lucas, Sir Jocefyn
Pitman, Sir James
Thomas, Peter (Conway)


Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Pitt, Miss Edith
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


McAdden, Stephen
Pott, Percivall
Thompson, Richard (Croydon, S.)


MacArthur, Ian
Powell, Rt. Hon. J, Enoch
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


McLaren, Martin
Price, David (Eastleigh)
Tiley, Arthur (Bradford, W.)


McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia
Prior, J. M. L.
Turner, Colin


Maclay, Rt. Hon. John
Prior-Palmer, Brig. Sir Otho
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Maclean, Sir Fitzroy (Bute&amp;N. Ayrs.)
Profumo, Rt. Hon. John
Tweedsmuir, Lady


MacLeod, John (Ross &amp; Cromarty)
Proudfoot, Wilfred
van Straubenzee, W. R.


McMaster, Stanley R.
Pym, Francis
Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hon. Sir John


Macmillan, Rt. Hn. Harold (Bromley)
Quennell, Miss J. M.
Vickers, Miss Joan


Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries)
Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin
Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis


Maddan, Martin
Rees, Hugh
Wakefield, Sir Wavell (St. M'lebone)


Maginnis, John E.
Rees-Davies, W. R.
Walder, David


Maitland, Sir John
Renton, David
Walker, Peter


Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hon. Sir R.
Ridley, Hon. Nicholas
walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir Derek


Markham, Major Sir Frank
Ridsdale, Julian
Wall, Patrick


Marlowe, Anthony
Rippon, Geoffrey
Ward, Dame Irene


Marples, Rt. Hon. Ernest
Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)
Watkinson, Rt. Hon. Harold


Marshall, Douglas
Robinson, Sir Roland (Blackpool, S.)
Webster, David


Marten, Neil
Robson Brown, Sir William
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Mathew, Robert (Honiton)
Rodgers, John (Sevenoaks)
Whitelaw, William


Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)
Roots, William
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Maudling, Rt. Hon. Reginald
Ropner, col. Sir Leonard
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Mawby, Ray
Royle, Anthony (Richmond, Surrey)
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Russell, Ronald
Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick


Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.
Scott-Hopkins, James
Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard


Mills, Stratton
Seymour, Leslie
Woodhouse, C. M


Montgomery, Fergus
Sharpies, Richard
Woodnutt, Mark


More, Jasper (Ludlow)
Shaw, M.
Woollam, John


Morgan, William
Shepherd, William
Worsley, Marcus


Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir Jocelyn



Nabarro, Gerald
Skeet, T. H. H.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Nicholls, Sir Harmar
Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'rd &amp; Chiswick)
Mr. Edward Wakefield and




Colonel Sir Harwood Harrison.

Orders of the Day — CROFTERS (SCOTLAND) BILL

Order for consideration, as amended (in the Standing Committee), read.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the Bill be recommitted to a Committee of the whole House in respect of the Amendments to Clause 2, page 1, line 11; Clause 7, page 7, line 10; Clause 11, page 12, line 39; Clause 13, page 17, line 23; and Clause 14, page 18, lines 3 and 12, standing on the Notice Paper in the name of Mr. Maclay.—[Mr. Maclay.]

Question amended, by adding, at the end:
and in respect of the Amendment to Clause 6, page 5, line 18, standing on the Notice Paper in the name of Mr. Thomas Fraser".—[Mr. T. Fraser.]

and, as amended, agreed to.

Bill immediately considered in Committee.

[Sir GORDON TOUDCHE in the Chair]

Clause 2.—(PROVISIONS AS TO NEW CROFTS AND ENLARGED CROFTS.)

7.12 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. John Maclay): I beg to move, in page 1, line 11, to leave out "fifty" and to insert "seventy-five".
I wonder whether it would be for the convenience of the Committee if we took, at the same time, the Amendment in Clause 14, page 18, line 3, leave out "fifty" and insert "seventy-five".
The second Amendment is not directly consequential, but the two are closely linked together. I gather that that is the will of the Committee.

The Chairman: Yes.

Mr. Maclay: The purpose of the first Amendment is to raise from 50 to 75 acres the limit, exclusive of any share in common pasture, within which a new crofting holding must fall, that is if the rent of the holding exceeds the alternative limit of £50 per annum, if it is to be eligible for consideration for bringing into crofting.
In Standing Committee there was, I think, a fairly wide feeling that in dealing with this question of creating new crofts we should recognise the trend towards larger and more economic crofts.

This is, indeed, a trend which the Commission is trying to encourage and make more easy. On the other hand, it would be wrong, as my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State explained to the Standing Committee, to bring into crofting, with all the special statutory procedures and treatment applying to it, what would be in effect sizeable farms.
My hon. Friend undertook to consider an adjustment of this 50-acres limit to take account of all the various considerations raised. We feel that the new proposed limit of 75 acres is right in the circumstances. It should make for the more flexible approach to the creation of new crofts in the upper ranges of size which may well be desirable in present circumstances and I am sure that the Amendment on this basis will find general acceptance among hon. Members on both sides of the Committee.
The second Amendment applies the revised acreage limit to those holdings, comparable to crofts, to which the crofters' grants will be extended in the circumstances set out in Clause 14. If we are extending these grants to holdings comparable to crofts it is only reasonable to keep the statutory limits on size and rents in line.

Mr. J. Grimond: I should like to thank the right hon. Gentleman for the first Amendment which follows more or less the promise made in Standing Committee in response to an Amendment in my name and to those in the names of various other hon. Members. It is a compromise. We shall see how it works and I hope that the Government will keep an open mind and feel themselves free to alter the acreage limit if that proves necessary.
7.15 p.m.
As for Clause 14, I regret the reappearance of subsection (1, a) in the Bill, but after last night we know that Members of another place have a certain expertise in leaving an (a) out of a Bill. I shall take care to see that their attention is drawn to this little a and I hope that when the Bill reappears here this too will be missing. The Amendment to subsection (1, b) merely brings the provisions of the Bill into line with the definition of a croft in the Bill and I welcome that Amendment.
Is it understood clearly now that Clause 14 (1, b) does not cover all sorts of tenant, but merely gives power to assist owner-occupiers as well as crofters? Those mysterious people who are occupiers of crofts of which they are also owners but who apparently are neither crofters nor occupiers other than crofters appear to be a very curious class. There are three now in the Clause—crofters, occupiers of holdings other than crofts, and those mysterious people who are occupiers of crofts and also owners thereof. I want to be clear whether ordinary tenants of every sort are excluded even though their holdings are comparable to a croft.

Mr. John Rankin: It may be that the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland finds within his own experience that the owner-occupier is a mysterious sort of individual but I would dissociate myself from that view, because, from all the information which I have received, the incorporation of the owner-occupier under subsection (1, a) which the hon. Member wanted to see removed from the Bill has been widely welcomed. I think that many people feel that after the war they were encouraged by the Government to invest all their savings in the acquisition of crofts and unlike the hon. Member I hope that subsection (1, a) will not disappear.

Mr. Thomas Fraser: I do not want to continue the discussion about owners or occupiers of land other than crofts. We discussed that quite a bit during the Committee stage, and I cannot see the Joint Under-Secretary of State giving an undertaking that this will be altered in the other place when the Bill reaches there.
We on this side of the Committee regard this Amendment as a step in the right direction. We appreciate that, throughout Scotland, in areas where agriculturists are working much richer land than obtains in the crofting counties, a holding of less than 50 acres is not an economic unit. In the circumstances, we think it right that this acreage of the croft, apart from common grazings, should be increased from 50 to 75 to come within the definition.
If we are to do it in Clause 14 in our definition of a croft, it seems reasonable to extend the acreage similarly in respect of these other holdings that are to be

given equal financial help with the crofters in the crofting counties. In the circumstances, we say "Thank you" to the Secretary of State for fulfilling his promise in Committee, and express the hope that, if this does work well, he will not feel obliged to stick to 75 acres if some day it seems reasonable to make it 100.
The last thing we want to do is so to increase the size of the crofts without providing alternative occupations in the Highlands that we merely hasten depopulation. We do not want to be the means of doing that, so it would be desirable to introduce other occupations for the crofting population before we extend the size of the croft too much.

Mr. A. C. Manuel: I welcome this extension of acreage because, with other hon. Members, in Standing Committee I took an active part in appeals to the Government to extend the size of crofts and also the rentals. I warmly welcome this extension, as it will be a real token of the Government's intention that crofts should be more viable in the seven Highland counties. There will be opportunities on later Amendments to discuss other matters bearing on this subject. I want now to associate myself with what has been said and to give a welcome to this provision.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Gilmour Leburn): I am grateful for the welcome given to this Amendment. I was a little worried in case I had misunderstood what the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) said. As I read Clause 14 we have three types to deal with. First, there are the
… occupiers of crofts who are also the owners thereof …
That type of person is very often an ex-crofter who has bought his croft, but his croft has not necessarily come out of crofting.

Mr. E. G. Willis: What does the hon. Gentleman mean?

Mr. Leburn: The land may still be a croft.

Mr. Willis: Surely a croft must be a certain area of land which is let under special legal conditions of tender? Is that not a definition of a croft? Otherwise, what is a crofter?

Mr. Leburn: If the hon. Gentleman will read Clause 14 (1, a) he will see that it says
… occupiers of crofts who are also the owners thereof …
The type of person I was trying to explain about is a crofter who has bought his croft. It might, to the hon. Gentleman, cease to be a croft then, but technically it does not necessarily cease to be a croft. We discussed this matter upstairs and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will believe me when I say that. While I understand his difficulty, technically it is still a croft. Clause 14 (1, b) says
for occupiers of holdings, other than crofts …
That means land of like economic status—land where the occupiers are like sub-tenants of crofts.
I hope that all members of the Committee understand that we are keen to extend these grants to sub-tenants in order that crofters might be the more ready and keen to sublet their crofts, allowing these sub-tenants to get the advantage of the grants.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 6.—(ASSESSMENT OF COMPENSATION FOR IMPROVEMENTS.)

Mr. T. Fraser: I beg to move, in page 5, in line 18, to leave out "on the open market".
I hope that the Secretary of State will be able to accept this Amendment. Subsection (2) of Clause 6 deals with the assessments of compensation for improvements. The Secretary of State has an Amendment down later to take out the words in line 19
… for use for crofting purposes
In assessing the amount of compensation—this is rather a long subsection and I will not trouble the Committee by reading it all out—an endeavour is to be made to assess the amount that might reasonably be expected to be received by the landlord
… in respect of the improvement from a person who might reasonably be expected to obtain the tenancy of the croft if the croft were offered on the open market … for use for crofting purposes …
If the Secretary of State's Amendment is passed, the words
… for use for crofting purposes …

will be taken out. This would obviously widen the category of person who might be expected to make an offer for the tenancy of the croft. If we widen that category and leave in the words "on the open market", then we shall appear to be inviting an assessment of the highest possible figure.
This might be seen to be an advantage to the outgoing crofter, but subsection (3) says that any amount of compensation assessed above what would have been got under the earlier provision will be paid by the Treasury. We should not leave the door open too wide to allow for a ridiculously high figure of assessment to be made, which may or may not affect the outgoing tenant but which would be an improper burden upon the Exchequer. By accepting our Amendment the Committee would be dealing with the tenancy of the croft if the croft were offered for letting as a separate croft, leaving out the few words which the Secretary of State proposes to leave out and also the words "on the open market". I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will accept the Amendment.

7.30 p.m.

Mr. Willis: I hope that the Government will look favourably on this Amendment or, at least, tell us what has been the result of their deliberations on this subject arising from the discussions in Committee. This phrase and its meaning were referred to in a number of speeches in Committee. Some of my hon. Friends, including my hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan) who, unfortunately, is not here tonight, and my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Rankin) and the Leader of the Liberal Party, the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond), also asked what was the relevance of these words in many Highland areas. In many circumstances there is no open market, or very little. The croft might be in a remote area in Western Ross or north-west Sutherland, or an area like that. What is the open market value of the croft in those circumstances? What is more important, what is the open market value of the improvements? We were given no information about that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) has given one side of the coin, but the other is that


a crofter might get nothing at all, because there might be no open market, and yet he might have spent a considerable sum on making improvements to the croft. We did not like the words when we discussed the matter in Committee. We did not know what they meant, and they did not seem to mean very much. We said that they were liable to have the effect indicated and we thought that the Government might have done something about the matter by now.
Even if the Government think that deleting these words would not improve the Bill, at least they should give an undertaking to reconsider the matter before the Bill goes to another place to see whether something better can be provided in the Clause, so that a crofter who has made improvements at least gets some compensation for them, even though the open market value may be nothing.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton quoted a case in which the open market value might be very high—for instance, if someone wanted to start a caravan site, or something of that sort, in the Highlands when he might be willing to pay a fantastic price for the croft. My hon. Friend pointed out the financial burden which would fall upon the Exchequer, but not upon the landlord. In view of all the uncertainty, we ought to have something better than we now have. If our Amendment is not acceptable, at least the Government should reconsider the matter before the Bill goes to another place.

Mr. Rankin: I hope that the Secretary of State will pay serious regard to what has been said, for the words "open market value" have no relevance to the circumstances with which we are dealing. If they were omitted, there would be no weakening of the subsection. They are used in a climate in which they do not belong.
My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) said that a crofter might make permanent improvements on his croft in which case the value would accrue to the landlord and not to the crofter. If the croft were inaccessible, in an area where transport was not frequent and where transport for conveying the crofter's children to school was not as adequate as in

many other places, the open market value of the croft—it not being within easy reach of a town—would be very low.
I am certain that the Lord Advocate will have very tender memories of the morning when we tried to give some reality to the meaning of the words "on the open market". With all his wonderful legal training and the natural ability that goes with it, when he had finished his explanations, along with help from hon. Members on both sides of the Committee, we were in an even deeper fog than before he embarked on the task of elucidating the meaning of the Clause. I do not know whether further thought will enable him to impart greater clarity to the Clause than it presently contains.
I hope that the Secretary of State will take the easy way out. To talk of open market value in the circumstances of many of these crofts is not to talk in the language of reality. We would not like to place crofters in the position of the Imperial Tobacco Company whose shares' open market value suddenly crashed this afternoon. That is not the atmosphere in which we have to deal with crofting. The Secretary of State has power to lift crofts out of such circumstances by accepting the Amendment. The Amendment is sound and sensible and I encourage the Government to take a sound and sensible approach to it.

Mr. Manuel: I hope that the Government will accept the Amendment and that, if they are not immediately seized of its importance, at least they will keep an open mind about open market value. Without dismissing the value of the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis), I am more concerned with the argument of my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser). In the remoter areas these words have no meaning. Where would the competition come from in the remote areas to make for a genuine open market value? As against that, in more populous areas prices could be driven up. The whole intention in Standing Committee was to do everything we could to encourage the community spirit and to help someone from the township to move into a vacant croft, someone with a kindred association with it. In considering this Amendment, we must


have regard to the Amendment in the name of the right hon. Gentleman, in page .5, line 19, to leave out
for use for crofting purposes".
That Amendment gives us some idea of what the Government are aiming at, because it is an invitation to let the croft as a separate entity not for crofting purposes. It could be used for a petrol station or as a caravan site, or something akin to that.
We must have a clear explanation about this Amendment.

The Temporary Chairman (Sir Norman Hulbert): Order. The hon. Member must not discuss an Amendment which is to be moved on Report, because at the moment we are in Committee.

Mr. Manuel: I hope that I have not strayed beyond the bounds of order. I am discussing the Amendment which has been moved by my hon. Friend, but I was referring to the Amendment in the name of the right hon. Gentleman.

The Temporary Chairman: The Amendment in page 5, line 19, will arise on Report. It cannot be discussed while we are in Committee.

Mr. Manuel: I agree, Sir Norman, I was making only an oblique reference to it in passing.
I appeal to the Government to accept the Amendment which has been moved so that we shall not have the difficulty of inflated prices and unreal advertisements in remote areas.

Mr. Grimond: I do not want to reiterate the doubts that I expressed in Committee upstairs about the meaning of the words "on the open market" in certain parts of the Highlands and Islands, but I should like to ask the Government whether my interpretation of the meaning of the Clause as it stands and the effect of the Amendment is correct.
To take a concrete example, if this Bill had been an Act when the island of Soay came to be depopulated, it would have been held that the market value of the crofts was nil, and the crofters could then have asked that the Secretary of State for Scotland should pay the difference between nil and the amount of compensation which would have been, and in fact was, payable under the law as it stood under the 1955 Act. Am I

right in thinking that that is the effect of writing in the words "on the open market"?
7.45 p.m.
The next point is that if we had such an island as Soay which was dealt with under this Bill when it becomes an Act, the next time a croft changed hands there would be no compensation on the existing improvements which had been dealt with in the manner that I have described, but any new improvements would fall to be dealt with, if these words "on the open market" were left in the Bill, in the manner described in the next following subsection to which we may not refer. I want to be clear whether my interpretation of what we are doing is correct.

The Lord Advocate (Mr. William Grant): May I deal first with the point raised by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond), because I think that it goes to the heart of the matter. If I understood him aright, he is correct in what he says. We may get cases where the market value if not nil is at any rate nominal. At the moment under the existing legislation one gets the inflated price and the inflated compensation to which the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Manuel) referred obliquely.
This question was considered at some length in Committee upstairs, and I will try to explain briefly why I think that these words ought to be left in the Bill. If we leave these words in the Bill, the Land Court has to assess the offer which a landlord would get for the vacant croft and the associated improvements if the vacancy of the croft and the nature of the permanent improvements on it were made known to such persons as might be potential tenants. One method of doing this would be by advertisement, and at the present time in many cases vacancies of crofts are advertised. In that sense the words "on the open market" are used.
If these words were omitted the subsection could mean that the Land Court could have regard to some private arrangement between a landlord and a potential tenant whether or not the offer made by that person fell short of what the landlord might otherwise have been able to get if the tenancy had been made more widely known.
The subsection has this commonsense result, that if there are potential tenants who would be approved by the Crofters Commission, who know about this because of advertisements or otherwise, one could find the value of the croft on the open market. The difficulty is that under present conditions the Land Court assumes that there will be an incoming tenant. This led to the trouble in Soay, and, if I remember rightly, to the bankruptcy of the landlord.
Under the existing provisions no inquiry is made 'by the Land Court about whether there is a potential tenant. This obviously leads to hardship on both sides. I suggest that we are not inflating the value. What we are doing is to discover what the improvements on the croft will fetch in any area. If it is a purely nominal value, fair enough, and on that occasion, or on that first occasion, the Exchequer will make up the compensation to what would be paid under the existing law.

Mr. T. Fraser: I am sorry to say that the Lord Advocate is wrong. The Exchequer will make up only the difference between what would have been assessed under the 1955 Act and such greater amount as is assessed under this Bill. Subsection (3) states:
… if the amount last-mentioned"—
that is the amount assessed under the 1955 Act—
is greater than the amount fixed or assessed by the Land Court as aforesaid,"—
that is, under subsection (2) which we are discussing—
the difference between the two said amounts shall be payable to the crofter by the Secretary of State
So that if by the removal of "on the open market" the sum assessed—a purely nominal figure under subsection (2)—is less than would have been assessed under the 1955 Act, there is no provision in the Bill for the Secretary of State to make up the difference. The Lord Advocate was, I think, caught out by that one.

The Lord Advocate: I am sorry. It is the difference between the old and the new where the new is less.

Mr. Fraser: Where the new is less, the Government do not come into the picture. That was not what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said.

The Lord Advocate: I am sorry, it was what I meant to say. If by a slip of the tongue I got it wrong, I apologise. It is the difference between the old and the new where the new is less.

Mr. Fraser: Surely, it is the difference between the old and the new where the new is greater. I do not want to prolong the discussion, but that is the position. The Government make up the difference between the old and the new where the new is greater than the old.

The Lord Advocate: I said "less than", not "greater than".

Mr. Fraser: I am sorry. We can pick up the point when we discuss the Motion, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill". I do not want to prolong the discussion, but I repeat the words in subsection (3):
if the amount last mentioned"—
being the amount under the 1955 Act—
is greater than the amount fixed or assessed by the Land Court as aforesaid"—
that is, if the amount last mentioned, under the 1955 Act, is greater than the amount fixed or assessed by the Land Court as aforesaid—under the Bill
the difference between the two said amounts shall be payable by the crofter to the Secretary of State".
I think, after all, that the Lord Advocate is right and I am wrong. I apologise for that.
In dealing with the Amendment, however, the Lord Advocate was imagining conditions in which the croft would be advertised, and it was only where it was advertised that there would be a proper figure. In many cases, the croft would not be advertised and the figure to be assessed is not the figure which is assessed as the result of advertisement and applications for the croft. Indeed, the word "if" appears at line 18, which states: "if the croft were offered". It is not "when the croft is offered".
In many cases where there is a renunciation, or a tenancy is terminated, it will be where there is reorganisation or where larger crofts emerge, so that the croft will not be offered for reletting where an endeavour has to be made to assess fair compensation. Therefore, there will not be the test of advertising and the amount to be assessed will,


obviously, be a guess. I do not, however, want to pursue the matter. If the Lord Advocate does not agree with this proposition, I do not propose to continue the debate.

Amendment negatived

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 7.—(AMENDMENT OF PROVISIONS OF ACT OF 1955 RELATING TO RIGHT OF DISPOSSESSED ABSENTEE CROFTER TO CQUIRE DWELLING-HOUSE.)

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 7, line 10, at the end, to insert:
(5) The Commission shall, on being so requested by a crofter, act on behalf of such crofter in any matter connected with the grant to him in pursuance of the said section seventeen of a conveyance in feu of the dwelling-house and other pertinents on the croft and the recording of such conveyance in the Register of Sasines.
(6) Any expenses incurred by the Commission in complying with a request made to them by a crofter under the last foregoing subsection or in preparing and recording a conveyance as mentioned in subsection (5) of the said section seventeen shall be borne by the Commission and shall not be recoverable by them from any other person.
Hon. Members who were in Committee upstairs will remember that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) moved an Amendment which had, in substance, a rather similar effect to this one. It was designed to ensure that the Crofters Commission would meet the legal costs incurred in granting a conveyance in feu under Section 18 of the 1955 Act to an aged crofter.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has considered the arguments which the hon. Member put forward. This Amendment is designed to meet his case and goes even further. The new subsection (5) enables the crofter to whom a conveyance is granted to ask the Commission to act for him. This applies not only to an aged crofter, but it also enables an absentee crofter and a crofter who wishes, in a reorganisation scheme, to take a conveyance in feu of his dwelling-house to ask the Commission to act for him, too. In addition, the new subsection (6) provides that the Commission itself will meet all expenses in carrying out the work. We have made it clear that the Commission will meet the expenses incurred by a crofter in connection with preparing and recording a conveyance under Section 17 (5) of the 1955 Act.

Mr. Willis: I should like to express the gratitude of my hon. Friends and myself for the Government's action in accepting our proposal. It will be helpful in the Highlands and will be appreciated by the crofters. It will be helpful in the endeavour to persuade aged crofters to allow their land to be used for the purpose of expanding other crofts. There have been great difficulties about this since the Crofters Commission was set up. The number of aged crofters who wanted to retain their crofts and to allow the croft land to go has not been very great. This proposal should have beneficial effects and be of great value to the Commission and its work, as well as helpful to the crofter.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 11.—(SUBLETTING OF CROFTS.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 12, line 39, to leave out from the beginning to the end of the subsection and to insert:

(a) where it was entered into without the consent in writing of the landlord of the croft, then if within six months from the commencement of this Act the landlord and the crofter intimate jointly to the Commission that the sublease has been entered into and furnish the Commission with the name of the subtenant and the duration of the sublease, the sublease shall be held to be valid as from the date of such intimation;
(b) where it was entered into with the consent in writing of the landlord, the sublease shall become null and void on the expiry of six months from the commencement of this Act unless before the expiry of that period the crofter has intimated to the Commission that the sublease has been entered into and has furnished the Commission with the name of the subtenant and the duration of the sublease.

The Temporary Chairman: I suggest that it would be convenient to discuss at the same time the two later Amendments in the name of the Secretary of State, in Clause 13, page 17, line 23, and in Clause 14, page 18, line 12.

Mr. Leburn: Yes, Sir Norman. The first of these Amendments is designed to simplify subsection (1) of Clause 11, as amended in Committee, to ensure uniformity of treatment of the three classes of sub-tenant at present mentioned in the Clause. The first part


of Clause 11 is a transitional provision. It deals with three kinds of sublease. The first are those entered into before the commencement of the Bill and without the written consent of the landlord. The second are those entered into between the publication of the Bill and its operation as an Act with the written consent of the landlord. Thirdly, there are those entered into before the publication of the Bill with the written consent of the landlord.
To simplify matters, the Amendment proposes that Clause 11 (1) shall deal with only two kinds of croft subleases, both of them voluntary and both of them entered into before the date on which the Bill commences to operate. The first kind of sublease dealt with in paragraph (a) of the Amendment is the pre-Act sublease—the one to which I refer as the "illegal" sublease—that is, the one which did not have the written consent of the landlord when it was entered into. The Amendment proposes that such a sublease shall become valid if within the period of six months following the commencement of the Act, the landlord and crofter intimate to the Commission that the sublease has been entered into and if they supply the Commission with details of the arrangement.
The second kind of sublease, dealt with in paragraph (b) of the Amendment, is the legal sublease validly entered into before the commencement of the Act—that is, with the written consent of the landlord.
8.0 p.m.
The Amendment provides that such a sublease, which is entirely valid, shall become null and void unless within a period of six months after the commencement of this Act, the crofter intimates to the Commission that a sublease has been entered into and furnishes it with the name of the sub-tenant and the duration of the sublease. I should like to stress that in neither case is the consent of the Commission to the sublease necessary. All that is required is that the sublease has to be intimated to the Commission within a period of six months. We had a good deal of discussion on this point in the Standing Committee, and what we have done here simplifies the matter and also meets with

the general wishes of the Committee. The other two Amendments are consequential.

Mr. T. Fraser: We are again very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making this Amendment. We had quite a considerable discussion in the Standing Committee about the position of these subleases, which he has described as illegal subleases, that is, subleases without the consent of the landlord. From our side of the Committee, we argued rather strongly that these people, although they had, technically speaking, acted illegally in subletting the land, nevertheless had done something for the benefit of the community and certainly for the benefit of the croft. They were ensuring, by subletting in this way, what all of us wished, namely, the cultivation of the croft. We asked that the position should be regularised by a provision of this kind being written into the Bill, and we are very grateful to the Joint Under-Secretary for having met us.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 13.—(MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS REGARDING SUBLEASES OF CROFTS.)

Amendment made: In page 17, line 23, leave out from beginning to first "of" in line 24 and insert:
(a) has been intimated to the Commission under paragraph (a) or (b).—[Mr. Maclay.)

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 14.—(AMENDMENT OF POWERS OF SECRETARY OF STATE WITH RESPECT TO GIVING OF FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE IN CROFTING COUNTIES.)

Amendments made: In page 18, line 3, leave out "fifty" and insert "seventy-five".

In line 12, leave out from "subleases" to second "or" in line 14 and insert intimated".—[Mr. Maclay.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Willis: We have not had an explanation of the last Amendment from the hon. Gentleman, and I want to ask a question concerning the crofter who occupies a croft and who owns it. I


want to know whether he is not already a crofter. If he is already a crofter, is he not already entitled to the benefit of the financial assistance mentioned in this Clause under the 1955 Act? In other words, I return to the point raised by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond). We have never yet had any satisfactory definition of this.
According to the definition given by the hon. Gentleman during the Committee stage, it would appear that a crofter is a man who occupies a croft under certain conditions of tenure. It seems to me, therefore, that a croft is a holding which is let under certain conditions of tenure. I should have thought that that was right, because otherwise it would cease to be a croft. If the man ceases to be a crofter, it would cease to be a croft, and if it ceases to be a croft it is a smallholding under paragraph (b) of the new subsection. If it does not cease to be a croft, it is already covered by the 1955 Act.
Surely that is the position, and I should be glad if the hon. Gentleman would try to explain this, at least to me, being a simple sort of person who does not understand these legal technicalities. Quite frankly, I do not understand this sub-section. I certainly think that if the hon. Gentleman cannot give us a satisfactory explanation he should look at it again.

Mr. Leburn: I understand the hon. Gentleman's difficulty, because I am in the same difficulty myself. I can only tell him that I am advised by the highest legal authority at my disposal—

Mr. Willis: Oh, dear.

Mr. Leburn: —that it is, in fact, possible for a man to own a piece of ground—

Mr. Willis: And to work it?

Mr. Leburn: —and to work it—land which was a croft, but he has now bought that piece of land and become the owner thereof, having been encouraged to buy it—but, notwithstanding that fact, technically or legally, until application is made to the Secretary of State to take it out of crofting, it is still a croft. If that owner who has then bought it should, by any strange mischance, let it, the person who then gets it would become a crofter.

Mr. Willis: If I own a croft and work that croft, I am a crofter. Surely, if I buy a fruit shop and sell fruit, I am a fruiterer. If I buy a bookshop and sell books, I am a bookseller, if I buy a farm and farm it, I am a farmer. But here we have the curious situation in which a man, because he bought the croft and works it, ceases to be a crofter and becomes something else.

Mr. Leburn: Perhaps it would help the hon. Gentleman if he refers to Section 3 (2) of the 1955 Act, where he will see that the expression "crofter" means the tenant of the croft. A crofter is the tenant of a croft, and what we are trying to cover in Clause 14 (1, a) are the occupiers of crofts who are also the owners thereof.

Mr. T. Fraser: We had a short debate on this matter in the Standing Commit tee, but by the time we reached Clause 14 we were rushing through the Bill. [An HON. MEMBER "No."] Yes, of course, we were. We did not discuss it at any great length. We called attention, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) has just done, and as the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) did on an earlier Amendment this evening, to the confusion that arises as a result of the provisions of Clause 14.
May I make this suggestion to the Joint Under-Secretary and the Lord Advocate? If paragraph (a) were taken out altogether and the words "other than crofts" were deleted from paragraph (b), we should then be dealing with
occupiers of holdings situated in the crofting counties which are either holdings of which the area does not exceed
75 acres, as it now is
…or holding the annual rent of which, if they were crofts let to crofters under the Act of 1955 and this Act, would not, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, exceed fifty pounds, being occupiers, who in the opinion of the Secretary of State are of substantially the same economic status as a crofter".
All these things would then apply. If we deleted "other than crofts", we should be dealing with occupiers of all these holdings. The occupier can be either the owner or the tenant. That is the advantage of using a word like "occupier". If the words "other than crofts", in the first line of paragraph (b),


were deleted, the whole of paragraph (a) would be quite unnecessary. I do not want an "off-the-cuff" answer. We discussed the question in Committee up- stairs. I merely ask that consideration be given to my proposal, with a view to seeing whether this adjustment can be made when the Bill reaches another place.

Mr. Rankin: I have no objection to the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), because, like my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis), I am a simple person. I am guided by letters I have received from owner- occupiers. This was one of the things in the Bill which they welcomed. They had been encouraged to invest what savings they had in taking over what they thought were crofts.

Mr. T. Fraser: I do not think that my hon. Friend has followed me. I am not speaking against the owner-occupier. I am entirely in favour of the owner- occupier being brought into this. My difficulty is that all over the crofting counties a croft is assumed to be a piece of land which is occupied by a tenant on a peculiar form of tenancy. It was so described by the Joint Under-Secretary in Committee.

Mr. Rankin: I am sorry if I did not make myself quite clear. I appreciate what my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton has just said. I still want to be absolutely certain that the position of those whom we call owner-occupiers will not be in any way endangered. They gave a welcome to this part of the Bill when many of us on this side of the Committee were very critical of the Bill. It is generally agreed that they had a 0 per cent. case. That was recognised, although we did not bother about the technicalities of the matter. If certain technical aspects have been brought to light and they can be resolved in the way suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton without prejudicing the rights of owner-occupiers, I should welcome his suggestion.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. Grimond: I do not think that anyone in any part of the Committee ever desired to cut owner-occupiers out of the Bill. We all welcome their

inclusion. Most of us have worked for this for years. As has been explained on many occasions, they should be included in subsection (1, a). I have no doubt that the Joint Under-Secretary of State and the Lord Advocate by this time understand the point at issue. It is the old point that we do not want further to complicate the definition of "croft" or "crofter". I have brought cases to the notice of the Joint Under-Secretary in which this has led to genuine hardship, because people who thought they were entitled to get compensation as crofters have been told eventually that they are not entitled to get it and they have been put in difficulties.
I add my plea to that of other hon. Members that the Government should look again at Clause 14 (1, b) with a view to seeing whether perhaps by an Amendment to the subsection, possibly by omitting the words "other than crofts", they can get us out of this small dilemma. It is not a dilemma of substance on the Clause. It is merely a dilemma of drafting and possible confusion which the drafting may cause amongst simple-minded people like myself and many others owing to further confusion about the definition of "croft".
If the Government do not like the Amendment suggested by the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), I will suggest another possibility. We should make Clause 14 (1, b) read: "for occupiers of holdings who are not crofters". There is a slight difference between a crofter and a croft. As has been already pointed out by the Joint Under-Secretary, in Section 3 (2) of the 1955 Act a crofter is quite definitely described as a tenant. I do not think that we can pursue it further now, but perhaps the Lord Advocate can do something about it at a future stage. My suggestion may not be right, but that of the hon. Member for Hamilton may be.

The Lord Advocate: I will certainly look into this matter, but the difficulty is this. A crofter is by definition in Section 3 of the 1955 Act a tenant. As soon as he ceases to be a tenant of a croft he ceases to be a crofter. The holding of which he was tenant remains a croft, even if he buys it and remains working it. The hon. Members for


Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) and Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) suggested deleting paragraph (a) and amending paragraph (b). I will certainly look at that suggestion, but the difficulty I see at the moment is that there are a number of crofts, the occupiers of which would came under subsection (1, a), which are above the statutory limits. The statutory limit is written into subsection (1, b).

Mr. Grimond: How would they come above the statutory limit? The more we probe this the more alarming the situation becomes. Is the Lord Advocate now saying that there are holdings in the Highlands which are crofts but are both in excess of 50 acres and £50 rent?

The Lord Advocate: My information is that there are, but I will certainly have a look at it.

Mr. A. Woodburn: The Government are being very cautious? What are they afraid of? I have been looking at the Agricultural Report. If my calculations are right, on average the Government give £60 a year assistance to crofters. Are they terrified that somebody will get away with £60 a year? I hope that the Government will not be unduly gloomy about this but will take a few risks for the sake of doing the thing properly. I hope that they will adjust these paragraphs.

The Lord Advocate: I am sorry if I did not make myself clear. The right hon. Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) has got it the wrong way round. If I accepted the suggestion which has been made, we should cut out people who would receive grants under the Bill as it stands. We do not want to cut them out.

Mr. T. Fraser: The learned Lord Advocate has said that some crofts which come under subsection (1, a) exceed the limits stated in subsection (1, b). The occupiers of crofts who come under subsection (1, a) do not now receive the subsidies payable to crofters. I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman is saying that, if paragraph (a) were deleted and the words "other than crofts were deleted from paragraph (b), some would fall in between. At the moment they do not come under paragraph (b) but come under paragraph (a).
The right hon. and learned Gentleman will certainly correct me if I am wrong, but I suggest that that would apply only to those owner-occupiers who are quite unaware that they are owner-occupiers of crofts—and there are apparently many of them in the Shetlands—and who thought that when they became owner-occupiers many years ago they ceased to be crofters and that their holdings ceased to be crofts. They are the people whom the Lord Advocate fears will know that they really are the owners of crofts and, notwithstanding that their holdings exceed the limits set down in paragraph (b), will be able to come in under paragraph (a), and they will be the people who will have a grievance if we delete paragraph (a) and bring them in under paragraph (b).
I should have thought that a very sensible thing for the Government to do would be to define the word "croft". This is an appropriate Bill in which to do so. The Joint Under-Secretary thought that it was land held on a peculiar type of tenure and occupied by a tenant. In fact, he gave us a definition at dictation speed so that we could write it down. All that I would say to him, to 'the Secretary of State and to the Lord Advocate is that this would be an appropriate Bill in which to define what a croft is. We have been told that a crofter is the tenant of a croft, and up to now we have thought that a croft was a small farm or agricultural unit held under a peculiar form of tenancy. I cannot see why we should not so define the word that there will be no need for the owner of a croft which ceases to be occupied as a croft writing to the Secretary of State and saying, "Please delete this from the land recognised as crofting land."
Furthermore, much of the land which became crofting land after the passing of the 1886 Act is no longer occupied by crofters. Some of this land is now let by landlords to sporting tenants, and those poor tenants are quite unaware that, according to the Lord Advocate, they have become crofters because they happen to be tenants of crofts.
I hope that some thought will be given to this matter before the Bill becomes an Act. If tidying-up Amendments are made in another place we shall not hold up proceedings when the Bill comes back here, provided that we do not find that,


although paragraph (a) is dropped, new paragraphs (a) and (b) have been inserted in its place which have not been drawn to our attention.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill reported, with Amendments; as amended (in the Standing Committee and on recommittal), considered.

New Clause.—(NEIGHBOURING REORGANISATION SCHEMES.)

Where it is proposed over a reasonable period of time to reorganise two or more neighbouring crofting townships the Commission shall enter into consultation with the local authority and the appropriate public bodies concerned and prepare a long-term plan for the provision of the necessary services for the area and for its proper development. Any such plan shall be placed before the Secretary of State who may confirm it with or without modification.—[Mr. Willis.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Mr. Willis: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
In the main, the Bill arises out of the 1959 Report of the Crofters Commission, in which a number of recommendations were made. The Government accepted most of these recommendations, but omitted to accept the most important one, which is contained in paragraph 77, which says:
We suggest, further, that even with an improved procedure and stronger powers, this method of reorganisation"—
that is, the simple reorganisation scheme for a township dealt with in the Bill—
can be usefully applied only in relatively simple cases. For the more complex we think that the principle of long-term planning should be adopted to allow time to all concerned for appraisal and adjustment.
Later, paragraph 79 says:
The preparation and promulgation of a long-term plan for an area comprising a number of townships would confer the great advantage that all authorities concerned, for example, the County Councils, the Hydro-Electric Board and the Forestry Commission, would know in advance how crofting agriculture would shape in ten or fifteen years' time in a given area and would be able to comment and to offer advice in the light of their own forward planning. It should be particularly helpful to all concerned to have long warning of plans for afforestation.
We might have worded the Clause inadequately, but we have endeavoured

to accept fully that recommendation, and have said that where the Commission has it in mind to reorganise crofting townships which are close together in the same area it should consult the local authority and the appropriate public bodies concerned and prepare a longterm plan for the provision of the necessary services for the area, and for its proper development. That seems thoroughly desirable. I assume that the Crofters Commission will have in mind what it intends to do about certain areas. Under the Clause dealing with the reorganisation schemes it is laid down that the Commission can initiate a reorganisation scheme. I would have thought that where it does so it should act in the light of what is likely to be to the greatest benefit of the Highlands.
Even if a scheme is initiated at the request of a grazings committee or an individual crofter the Commission might well ask itself, "What about the neighbouring townships in this area? Next year we might reorganise this or another one". With that in mind it could consult the appropriate bodies and prepare plans for the provision of electricity and other necessary services for the area which would facilitate the development of the township.
8.30 p.m.
That seems to us to be a thoroughly desirable proposition. I was amazed, as I said on Second Reading, that the Government had not even considered it. I know that the Government have a rooted objection to planning. We see at the moment where this objection to planning is landing us—in parlous conditions. I can understand the Government having a doctrinaire objection to planning, but in the light of all the evidence that is available from almost everyone—the Crofters Commission is not a Socialist organisation coming forward with a recommendation to plan this; many other bodies have done the same-I cannot see why they should not accept the Clause.
What we propose is not what we should have liked to see—a proper development authority trying to develop the area as a whole. We recognise that under the present Government that is "out", and it would probably be out of order to discuss it on the Bill at this stage. What we have tried to do is


simply to advance a short distance along the road towards the proper development of these areas. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) was Secretary of State, he was responsible for a survey being made in Glen Oich and an endeavour to develop that area. The last time I was there, a considerable amount of development had been done. That ought to be done elsewhere. It can be done, as we suggest, on the basis of the reorganisation of townships which is being carried out by the Crofters Commission.
I believe that our Clause would improve the Bill. It would not damage it in any way. It would take nothing from the Crofters Commission. All it would do would be to lead to a small element of planning of the development of areas rather than small townships. We all know areas in the Higlands where there are townships close together, most of them perhaps not in an altogether neglected state but only partially being used. That is the type of township which the Commission ought to be reorganising. In those circumstances, surely what we suggest is desirable.

Sir James Duncan: Is there anything in the Clause which the Commission cannot do already either under the existing law or under the Bill as it exists?

Mr. Willis: I am not certain about that, but putting in the new Clause would draw the attention of the Commission to the fact that we should like this to be done. The Commission asked for these powers and this sort of planning in its own Report, and, therefore, I assume that it thought it would be a good thing if this provision could be included in legislation.
Even if the Secretary of State cannot accept the Clause because of the way in which it is worded, I hope that he will accept it in principle and put into the Bill a provision along these lines in another place. It seems to me that it could do nothing but improve the Bill and would certainly not do any damage at all.

Mr. Maclay: I confess that I was a little puzzled to know precisely what the objective of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) was in tabling

his Clause. Frankly, I think that he and the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) showed admirable ingenuity in getting another line in on a subject which has already been discussed at very considerable length and on a great many occasions.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East upon the way he presented the Clause, because its ultimate intention became apparent to me without his saying what it was. What he is doing is trying to find another approach to the general concept of the Highland Development Authority.

Mr. Willis: No.

Mr. Maclay: That was what I was bound to conclude from studying the wording of the new Clause.
One of the difficulties about the hon. Gentleman's proposal is that it empowers a form of consultation with a great many people, ending up in a plan, and I do not see how the Crofters Commission is technically the right body to do this. We have thought carefully about this question of long-term planning, but, in spite of what hon. Members opposite think about our views on planning, we have considered it on many occasions extremely carefully. In this case, it has certain attractions. As I say, we have given careful thought to the matter, but we concluded that the overriding need for flexibility in dealing with crofting townships ruled out any question of formal long-term planning of the kind envisaged in the new Clause. We have only to think of the economic position in a township which might be radically changed by a forestry scheme or an industrial project, which we are always searching for and sooner or later will land. Things might work out differently from what is laid down in a long-term plan.
The psychological effect on a crofter of the publication of a long-term plan which appeared to threaten the eventual disappearance of his family croft is an important human factor. That is something which might be contemplated in the short term. In considering this problem, the human element must be kept very much in mind. I do not put that forward as an overriding argument. The earlier argument, the need for flexibility, is much more potent.
For these and other reasons we have not included a long-term planning provision in the Bill. We think that to aid the Secretary of State of the day in considering a specific scheme or township reorganisation he should have a statement on the Commission's view on the prospects of development in the township and the surrounding district. I think that this is provided for in Clause 8 (6). I also think that that goes about as far as we can reasonably go. While I do not quarrel with the concept of planning which is clearly in the mind of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East, I feel that it is not right to try to formalise it to the extent that it would be formalised even if we tried to adapt the proposed new Clause. I believe that all that is necessary is in the Bill. Therefore, I hope that hon. Members will not press the new Clause.

Mr. Rankin: We have got the Secretary of State to travel a little way towards the objective which we have in mind. Yesterday, I accused him, perhaps unfairly, when he seemed to be confusing the development of Scotland with the development of the central belt in Scotland and dissociated himself from that accusation. I am glad that he did so. By this new Clause he is being asked to consider the long-term development of the Highlands. He says that this is getting the Highland Development Authority over by another means. But I think that the means are completely justified.
I will not quarrel with the right hon. Gentleman if he says that he would rather be the agent responsible for longterm planning than the Commission. I welcome that declaration, because, as long as the Secretary of State is the agent for long-term planning in the Highlands, which is just as necessary, if not more necessary, than planning in other parts of Scotland, then he can always be questioned by this House. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman is convinced that there must be some long-term plan for the Highlands.
The right hon. Gentleman must be convinced of that because we have been pouring millions of pounds into the Highlands. During the Committee stage these figures were very much in question. The Secretary of State prided himself

on the many millions that had been given to Highland development in its many forms. It is a matter which disturbs many of us, and which I am certain disturbs the right hon. Gentleman, that, despite all the money that has been given for a very worthy purpose—maintaining and increasing population in the Highlands and Islands—nevertheless depopulation still goes on.
That is the tragic fact. It has now reached the stage some of the islands have nobody living on them, with the result that an hon. Member on the Government side of the House came forward this week with the suggestion that he was prepared to take these depopulated islands and turn them into penal settlements for English prisoners. Is that not a horrible thing to have befallen a noble country?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Sir William Anstruther-Gray): Order. I doubt whether that is in order in discussing this new Clause.

Mr. Rankin: It seemed to me, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that it was in order, but I am not in any way putting my views against your Ruling, which, I hope, is not at the moment a firm Ruling.
I was merely suggesting that if we do not have planning for a constructive purpose we may have planning for another purpose. We may have planning to bring people to Scotland for reasons we do not want to see those people there. If we are to populate those deserted islands we must plan for the new inhabitants. We have to build and provide services and do all those things for the deserted islands to receive the English prisoners.
We should like the Secretary of State to say that he would spend that money on doing things for the people of the Highlands. Planning has to come at some time in some way for the Highlands. If it does not come in a way we want, it will come in other ways which are much inferior. The right hon. Gentleman seemed to think that if he accepted this new Clause it would have a psychological effect on the crofter.

Mr. Willis: Would not the psychological effect be likely to be a good one?

Mr. Rankin: I agree. That was the very point I was proposing to establish, that the psychological effect would be all to the advantage of the Highlands and the crofter because he would see things being prepared. The Secretary of State might become a sort of John the Baptist in the Highlands, "preparing the way". People would recognise the purpose of the planning. He would be able to give the crofter the assurance that he was preserving his rights to a croft and to more land where that was regarded as necessary.
I do not think that the psychological effect would be disadvantageous. I think that it would prove helpful. I agree that the right hon. Gentleman may not be able to tie himself too closely to the form of this new Clause. I do not think that that is expected. All we hope is that it will receive a word of welcome, and that we shall hear from the right hon. Gentleman that it marks the line which he is prepared to follow in seeking to regenerate the Highlands of Scotland.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. T. Fraser: The proposals in this new Clause fall far short of the Highland Development Authority proposed by hon. Members on this side of the House. One thing which a Clause of this kind would achieve would be to let the Crofters Commission know that Parliament is still aware of the powers and duties which we gave to it under Section 2 of the 1955 Act. We have seen from the Annual Reports of the Commission, year after year, that it has been anxious to make use of those powers of collaboration with all the other authorities in the North of Scotland to secure the economic well-being of the area. The Commission has suffered a lot of frustration and disappointment, and the adoption of such a Clause as this would have given it a little encouragement.
Nowhere else in the Bill is there any recognition of the existence of the powers contained in Section 2 of the 1955 Act. Its acceptance would have shown that we were sure that, where there were two or more reorganisation schemes side by side, the Commission would be empowered and expected to collaborate with the other authorities with whom, under the 1955 Act, it is enjoined to collaborate, to try to work out pro-

posals for the economic well-being of the community as a whole, so that the reorganisation schemes will not merely hasten the depopulation of the area. For these reasons, I had hoped that the Secretary of State might be able to accept the new Clause. If anything I have said has made any impact upon him, I hope that even now the right hon. Gentleman will say that this appears a sensible thing to do and that the Government will do it.

Mr. Maclay: Of course, everything which is said by the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) makes an impact upon me. The result of that impact, however, is not always calculable. I have noted with interest the reasons which hon. Members have advanced for putting down this Clause, and with certain of their objectives I am in entire sympathy. But, for the reasons which I have stated, I do not think that we can accept this Clause. That does not mean that I, as Secretary of State, am not continually thinking of Scotland as a whole and various areas in particular. A great deal of thought is given to the long-term future of the Highlands.

Question put and negatived.

Clause 1.—(INCREASE IN MEMBERSHIP OF CROFTERS COMMISSION.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 1, line 5, after "1955" to insert:
(which provides amongst other things that the Commission shall consist of not more than six members)".
This is no more than a drafting Amendment and is designed for clarification.

Mr. Grimond: I appreciate that this is a drafting Amendment, but I should like to say a word about it to the Government. When it comes to increasing the size of the Crofters Commission, I hope that they will not only take the opportunity to do what was urged upon them during the Committee stage discussions and add a practising crofter to the Commission, but also that they will try to include people with experience of different matters. I should like to see as a member of the Commission an industrialist who could advise about bringing industry to the Highlands area. I should like to see as a member an expert on marketing and salesmanship, someone who knew what the markets require and who could help in that direction.
I believe that it would be valuable to have as a member a person with experience of solving the kind of problems which are met with in the Highlands and Islands but who had, perhaps, gained his experience in a different setting. For instance, we might get a man who has experience of transport problems in similarly rather sparsely populated areas elsewhere.
I do not want to go into this further now, but I should like to put those thoughts into the heads of the Government, and if they would like me to suggest any names of industrialists or salesmen, people who could sell ideas to the Commission, I should be happy to oblige. However, I put these thoughts forward very seriously. This gives the Government an opportunity to put on to the Commission some people with differing experiences, of varying types; some people who could really do a great deal by bringing their varied experience to bear on the problems with which the Commission has to deal and to help us with the great question of what things we are to grow next in the Highlands and how to get them sold.

Mr. Leburn: I would add just one word in reply to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond). Although the head of the Government in Scotland was not here to hear his words of wisdom I can assure the hon. Gentleman that my right hon. Friend is determined to take into account not only the views of the hon. Gentleman but other views which were put forward when we were considering this matter in the Standing Committee.
I do not want to enumerate the types of persons we might have to broaden the experience of the Commission. The hon. Gentleman himself has mentioned people experienced in transport, and other hon. Members have mentioned people with experience of such things as marketing and publicity. I think that the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) has ideas about practical crofters —or is it practising crofters? I just forget at the moment. However, I can assure the House that my right hon. Friend has these points very much in mind.

Mr. Willis: On a point of order. I wonder, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, if you

could advise us whether you intend to call the next Amendment on the Paper in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) and my name, in page 1, line 7, at end insert:
and as if after the words 'Secretary of State' where they first appear there were inserted the words 'two of whom shall be practising crofters'".
If not, we might discuss it now.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: No. I can explain to the hon. Member that the next Amendment, in the name of the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) is not selected.

Mr. Manuel: I would thank my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) for bringing out this information. I feel that we must take our opportunity now to elicit from the Government the composition of the Crofters Commission. It is not just a question of the additional three. Possibly there ought to be a whole reorganisation of the duties, and we ought to go into this matter very thoroughly. I had anticipated, like my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East, that we should be dealing with that aspect of the matter on the next Amendment, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), but now we learn that we are not to have that opportunity.
I very much appreciate the readiness of the Government, after our discussions upstairs, to agree that the membership of the Commission, six, was too small, end their ready agreement to increase it to nine members. That is what we are doing here.

Mr. Leburn: On a point of order. That is not what we are doing here. We are not by this Amendment increasing the number of the Commission from six to nine.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Perhaps I should make clear that the fact that the next Amendment has not been selected would not justify hon. Members making speeches on that Amendment while we are discussing this one.

Mr. Manuel: I appreciate that very much, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but I take it that long and, perhaps, wearying speeches can be made on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill," and I was trying to avoid that.

Mr. Willis: Further to that point of order. You have, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, allowed certain limited references to the types of persons who can serve on the Commission. I take it that it would still be in order to make what has been called tonight an oblique reference to who may serve on the Commission.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Yes. The House is well aware that a certain amount of reasonable latitude is allowed.

Mr. Manuel: Thank you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I cannot understand this attack from the Joint Under-Secretary. The point that I was trying to make was much more limited than the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East.

Mr. Willis: I have not yet spoken on this Amendment.

Mr. Manuel: My hon. Friend made quite a long speech in an interruption which, I thought, dealt with the point. I prefer now to leave my remarks, which were going to be very complimentary because of the Government's acceptance of Clause 1, as amended, until we get to the Question "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

Mr. Willis: I add my voice to the effect that I hope that now the Government have so kindly accepted the proposals put forward in Committee to extend the size of the Commission, we shall have a type of Commission which would appear to be more adaptable to the needs. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) as to the type of people who may be put on the Commission. I would, however, point out that one of the constant criticisms of the Crofters Commission at present is that it has insufficient practical crofting experience. I hope that that will also be remedied when it comes to appointing additional members.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 2.—(PROVISIONS AS TO NEW CROFTS AND ENLARGED CROFTS.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 2, line 1, to leave out subsection (2) and to insert:
(2) Where the owner of any land which is not itself a croft and which does not form part

of a croft agrees to grant a tenancy of such land to any crofter, then—

(a) except in such a case as is mentioned in paragraph (b) of this subsection, if the owner of the said land and the crofter agree that such land will form part of any croft of which the crofter is tenant, the land shall, as from the date of entry under the said tenancy, form part of such croft, and the Act of 1955 and this Act shall apply accordingly to the croft as so enlarged;
(b) in a case where the area of the croft (exclusive of any common pasture or grazing held therewith) together with the area of the land exceeds seventy-five acres and the rend of the croft together with the rent under the said tenancy exceeds fifty pounds, the Secretary of State may, on an application in that behalf made to him jointly by the owner of the land and the crofter, direct that the land shall form part of the croft and, if he makes such direction, then as from the date of the direction or the date of entry under the said tenancy, whichever is the later, the land hall form part of the croft, and the Act of 1955 and this Act shall apply accordingly to the croft as so enlarged.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: It would, I think, be convenient for the House to discuss with this Amendment the Amendments in page 2, lines 17, 32, 35 and 36.

Mr. Leburn: Yes, I think that that would be for the convenience of 'the House.
During the debate in the Scottish Standing Committee on this Clause which deals with the bringing of noncrofting land into crofting, the Committee decided by a narrow majority—I would not like to describe to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, all the circumstances of that majority—

Mr. Rankin: On a point of order. Is it in order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, to bring into question the size of a majority? Are we not confined, on Report, to the fact that a majority of the hon. Members of the Committee came to a decision? Is not that the important thing and not the fact that it was a small majority? If a horse wins by the length of a nose it does not matter, it has won.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: It is perfectly in order for the hon. Member to make a reference Ito the size of a majority.

Mr. Willis: I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary intends to complete his picture of the narrow majorities by saying that they were reaffirmed on five different occasions.

9.0 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: That point appears to have been made.
I was saying that in two types of cases the Committee had decided that the approval of the Secretary of State to such an admission of non-crofting land should not be necessary. These cases were, firstly, where non-crofting land is added to a croft by way of enlargement and the enlarged croft is still within the alternative limits of 75 acres and £50 rent, and, secondly, where crofters' common grazing is enlarged by the addition of non-crofting land. I undertook to consider these Amendments, bearing in mind the Committee's expressed wish. I made it clear, in any case, that I would be bound to make provision for information about such enlargements to be notified to the Commission, otherwise the Commission's register of crofts would be defective.
In the discussion in Standing Committee it was also agreed that the words "is enlarged" in subsections (2) and (4) caused some doubt because the meaning of the word "enlarged" in the context was not clear, nor was the date from which the transaction became effective for the purpose of the subsection. I said that I would have to consider the drafting on this point.
One of the main purposes of including the Clause in the Bill was to ensure the same measure of control over the bringing of non-crofting land into the crofting ambit as is given under Section 16 (8) of the 1955 Act over the taking of crofting land out of crofting. There can be in these cases fairly wide considerations to be taken into account and it therefore seemed right that there should he statutory provision for scrutiny and approval. That is probably still my view, but I recognise that the enlargements, which under subsection (2) will apply without the crofter and the landowner having to seek approval, would be the types of application to which the Secretary of State in nearly all cases would give his approval in any event.
They will be used for the building of small crofts into larger and we hope more economic units. Therefore, I do not think that either of these provisions presents any substantial deviation from the main principle of the Clause and I accept them. The first three Amendments which we are now considering

deal accordingly with the drafting difficulties which I have mentioned and they also meet the wishes expressed by hon. Members in Standing Committee about these kinds of enlargements.
If the landlord and the crofter agree that the non-crofting land should be used to become part of the croft, then the Crofters Acts will automatically apply to the enlarged croft unless it exceeds both the acreage and the rental limits. In that event, joint application to the Secretary of State for a direction will be necessary. Similarly, if crofters and landlords agree to enlarge common grazings by cooperation in the crofting tenure of noncrofting land, the Acts will also automatically apply.
Notification of the automatic enlargements under subsections (2, a) and (4) will be made to the Commission by the landlord. The Secretary of State will be required to intimate to the Commission directions made by him under subsections (1) and (2, b) of the Clause as it is proposed to amend it. The other three Amendments are consequential.

Mr. T. Fraser: I regret that the Secretary of State, aided and abetted by the Joint Under-Secretary of State, has chosen to flout the decision of the Standing Committee in this way. The Joint Under-Secretary of State referred to the narrow majorities in the Committee. There were five Divisions on this matter, two of which resulted in votes of eight to seven. The next three resulted in votes in ten to seven in favour of the words now proposed to be taken out.
By these votes, the Committee decided that it was undesirable to have a croft, part of which would remain under the Agricultural Holdings Acts and part of which would be under crofting legislation. Land held under crofting tenure is land in respect of which the tenant has far greater security and for which he has responsiblity for providing fixed equipment, which includes draining, fencing and ditching.
On the other hand, land which does not come under crofting tenure but under the Agricultural Holdings Acts is land in respect of which this responsibility for draining, fencing and ditching continues to be that of the landlord. The Standing Committee thought it absurd that one could have land added to a croft or to common grazings which


would, none the less, remain outside crofting tenure.
I understand that by these Amendments the crofter and the landlord can agree to come within crofting tenure, whereas the Bill as it is now drafted says that if this land is added to a croft it will automatically come within crafting tenure without there being joint representation by landlord and tenant to the Secretary of State in favour of that being done.
I would rather the Bill remained as the Standing Committee made it. It made sense. It is nonsense, where one has an area of common grazings to say, when it is being drained, that the land beyond the copse will come under the Agricultural Holdings Acts, so that the responsibility for draining it will lie with the landlord, whereas the land on the near side of the copse will be crofting land, which it will be the responsibility of the crofters to drain. It is absurd to treat these two pieces of land independently. In all common sense the job should be done as one. That goes for all the work of regeneration, which is partly the responsibility of the land owner in certain respects.
It is a pity that the Joint Under-Secretary of State is restoring the Clause—not absolutely as it was originally but certainly considerably different from the form in which it was left in Standing Committee—in order to provide for this absurd situation. However, I realise that the Government are not willing to accept the position of the Standing Committee on this matter and are insisting on having their own way. I do not think it will make a great deal of difference to the Bill or to the Highlands, and in those circumstances I advise my right hon. and hon. Friends to let this Amendment go through.

Sir J. Duncan: The House will appreciate my desire to say something about this in view of the fact that I was debarred from saying something on a previous occasion. I do not propose to deal with anything other than a technical question concerning rents.
The Clause says
Where the owner of any land which is not itself a croft and which does not form part of a croft agrees to grant a tenancy to a crofter
this means that the rent has been agreed

before the tenancy is granted, and where the area of the land exceeds 75 acres and the rent exceeds £50, on application the Secretary of State can register the whole of an area as a croft. Presumably, in the first instance the Secretary of State will register the croft and the added agricultural land at the increased rent, which may be on an agricultural basis far part of the croft. What happens afterwards? Presumably, once it is a croft, at same stage the Land Court may fix a rent which may be different from that agreed between the owner and the tenant when the land was still agricultural and not a croft.
This is a highly technical matter and my hon. Friend may not be able to deal with it now, but I hope that he will study it. There should be some protection for the landowner if the rent is agreed on an agricultural basis for part of the holding, and the crofter should not have the right to apply to the Land Court for a reduction of rent, at any rate not until after a considerable period. I hope that my hon. Friend will consider that issue before the Bill leaves another place, if he cannot deal with it now.

Mr. Willis: I rise because I was rather interested in the fact that the Under-Secretary advised me that these Amendments were in fulfilment of policies made in Committee. They are nothing of the kind. They overturn decisions of the Committee reached on no fewer than five occasions. This is an amazing challenge to democracy and an amazing position for the Government to take up.
The Scottish Standing Committee took five votes on this Clause and made certain decisions, but the Government have now decided to overturn them with their English majority in the House. The Government could not overturn them by the votes of Scottish Members. They can do so only by the votes of hon. Members representing England, Wales and Northern Ireland. They did not have a majority in the Committee. What we are now getting is the Government of Scotland, and especially a part of Scotland about which other people know very little, the Highlands, on one of the most intricate and essentially Scottish problems of all—the crofters—by Members from Wales and England. I do not know what a Londoner knows about crofting.
This is making a complete farce of democracy and I am surprised that the Government should adopt this attitude which challenges all our democratic instincts.
I have no doubt that the Under-Secretary will adjourn to his constituency or somewhere else in Scotland at the weekend and will talk about the democratic government which we enjoy here. But this is exactly the opposite. We might as well be ruled by somebody in France or Germany.

Mr. Grimond: Or Russia.

Mr. Willis: Or Russia. This is an amazing doctrine. I do not want to make a long speech, although I could wax very eloquent on this issue, but I register my protest at the procedure which has been adopted.

9.15 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: I must answer this grave charge made by the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) and the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis).
In this set of Amendments I have tried as far as possible to meet the express wishes of the Committee upstairs, and I believe that I have largely done that. I warned the Committee upstairs that I might have to make drafting Amendments and introduce a provision whereby the Commission would be informed of these changes.
If one looks at subsections (2) and (4), there is little difference between what is now in the Bill and what is suggested in the Amendment. The difference which there might be is that if one looks at the Bill as printed it says:
Where any croft is enlarged by the addition thereto of land which is not itself a croft …
If the hon. Gentleman is referring to land pertaining before the introduction of the Bill, or the Act, then I agree that there might be some change, but I do not necessarily read the Bill as referring to land which pertains before the introduction of the Act.
I believe that that was the point over which there was some misunderstanding upstairs. There was some misunderstanding about the interpretation of the words "is enlarged". There was doubt about whether these were meant to be inter-

preted as "is enlarged at today", or,"is enlarged before today", or, "is enlarged for the passing of the Act".
If hon. Members feel that they ought to apply to land which has been added before the passing of the Act—not under a crofting tenure, but under an agricultural tenure—I agree that there may be some change, but I think that it would be unwise to put an interpretation like that onto the words "is enlarged". If that is done, I cannot see any owner of land being willing in future to make land available knowing that if he did so on agricultural tenure automatically it would be brought within the crofting ambit. I should have thought that it would have been inclined rather to restrict the amount of land which might be made available for enlarging crofts or for enlarging common grazings.

Mr. Woodburn: All sorts of different interpretations could be put on these words. Surely when the Bill becomes an Act we should be entitled to know what they mean, and they should not be open to different interpretations such as the hon. Gentleman mentioned. There must be some legal interpretation of these words.

Mr. Leburn: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for making my point. I think that there was difficulty of interpretation as the words stood in the Bill. That is why I have tried to make that clear in the Amendments which we are now discussing.
I will look into the rather intricate point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan).

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In page 2, line 17, leave out subsection (4) and insert:
(4) Where the owner of any land to which the Act of 1955 and this Act do not apply agrees to grant rights in any pasture or grazing land to the crofters sharing in any common grazing and the said owner and crofters agree that such land will form part of the said common grazing, then as from the date on which such rights are first exercisable by the crofters, the land shall form part of the common grazing, and the said Acts shall apply accordingly to the common grazing as so enlarged.
(5) The Secretary of State shall give notice to the Commission of any direction given by him under subsection (1) or (2) of this section, and the owner of any land which becomes part


of a croft or of a common grazing by virtue of paragraph (a) of subsection (2) of this section or, as the case may be, the last foregoing subsection, shall give notice to the Commission of the enlargement of such croft or common grazing.

In line 32, leave out from crofter "to shall" in line 33.

In line 35, at end insert "subsection (1) of".

In line 36, leave out from "croft" to end of subsection.—[Mr. Leburn.]

Clause 3.—(COMMISSION TO MAINTAIN REGISTER OF CROFTS.)

Mr. T. Fraser: I beg to move, in page 2, line 43, after "location", to insert "rent".
There seems to be an unfortunate omission from the Clause. It provides for the maintenance of a Register of Crofts. Subsection (2) states that
(2) There shall be entered in the Register of Crofts—

(a) the name, location and extent of every croft;
(b) the name of the tenant and of the landlord of each croft; and
(c) such other matters …"
I am concerned with paragraphs (a) and (b). An extremely important consideration in respect of a croft is the amount of rent. A croft is defined by reference to its area and to the rent for the land. It is odd that we should leave out from the information contained in the Register the amount of the annual rent of the croft.
Clause 2 (1, b) states that the Bill applies to a holding which may be made a croft of which the area does not exceed 75 acres or a holding of which the annual rent does not exceed £50. Therefore, the annual rent is an important consideration in determining whether the Bill applies to a holding. In the circumstances, it seems regrettable to omit from the particulars to be maintained in the Register of Crofts any reference to rent. I hope, therefore, that the Joint Under-Secretary will be able to accept the Amendment.

Mr. Leburn: When we considered the question of the Register of Crofts in Standing Committee, there was criticism that, perhaps, too much information was being asked for. I agree, however, with the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser). At present, the Register includes this information in regard to rent.

The point made by the hon. Member is a good one and on behalf of the Government I am happy to accept the Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 3, line 6, at the end to insert:
and shall send a copy of any new entry inserted by them after the commencement of this Act, or of any entry altered by them after such commencement, to the landlord and the tenant of the croft concerned, and shall intimate the omission of any entry to the owner and the tenant (if any) of the land concerned.
(3) The Commission shall, on a request for an extract of any entry in the Register of Crofts being made to them by a person who, in their opinion, has good reason for desiring an extract of the said entry, furnish that person with such extract certified by the person for the time being acting as secretary to the Commission; and a document purporting to be an extract of an entry in the Register and to be certified as aforesaid shall be sufficient evidence that the Register contains such an entry".

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it would be convenient for the House to take with this Amendment the following one, in line 7, to leave out subsection (3).

Mr. Leburn: Yes, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. These two Amendments fulfil undertakings which I gave in Standing Committee during discussion of Amendments in the name of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond).
The purpose of the first of these two Amendments is threefold. It provides that when the Commission alters or omits an entry from the Register of Crofts or includes a new entry, they will notify the landlord and tenant concerned. The Commission has been doing this in the past, but it has not been expressly obliged to do so.
Secondly, the Amendment makes it clear that any person who has a good reason for wishing to obtain an extract of an entry in the Register of Crofts may do so on application to the Commission. This will enable a person who claims, for example, to be the heir to a crofter to obtain an extract giving information about the croft. This point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan).
Thirdly, the Amendment makes it plain that when an extract from the Register of Crofts has been certified by the Secretary of the Commission, no


further proof will be required that there is such an entry in the register. That will not mean, however, that a certified extract from the Register will be conclusive of any of the information it contains. If any person thought that any of that information was incorrect, nothing could prevent him from challenging it, and if he could not get satisfaction in any other way, he could ask the Land Court to decide the matter under Clause 4 of the Bill.
The second Amendment, in line 7, is consequential on the first. It deletes the existing subsection (3) of Clause 3, which is to be superseded by the new subsection (3) in the first Amendment.

Mr. Grimond: I should like to thank the Government for these Amendments, which meet the point of two Amendments which I had put down on the Committee stage. I should like also to congratulate them on having recovered from the bout of recalcitrant totalitarianism from which they suffered earlier.
I take it that the new subsection (3) will provide a method by which in a legal case, whether in the sheriff court or the Land Court, we can get the Register produced; that is to say, that it will not only cover the case mentioned by the Joint Under-Secretary, in which somebody wants to refer to the Register and establish the possibility that he is the heir to a croft, but also will be a means of getting the Register When it needs to be produced in a court of law. It seems to be a rather ingenious way of covering both these points, and in a way which will safeguard the crofters against unjustifiable intrusion into their private affairs. A good deal of anxiety was expressed about this in Committee, and we did not want to leave the door too wide open to busybodies looking at the Register on a wet afternoon in Inverness. I think that we have adequately safeguarded against that danger.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In line 7, leave out subsection (3).—[Mr. Maclay.]

Clause 4.—(DETERMINATION OF QUESTIONS BY LAND COURT.)

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move in page 3, in line 40, after the first "the", to insert "Secretary of State or the".
This is really a tidying-up Amendment. In Committee, we excluded from the general jurisdiction of the Laid Court any questions of fact decided by the Commission in the discharge of its duties either under the 1955 Act or this Bill when it becomes an Act. There are certain duties put upon the Secretary of State both in the 1955 Act and in this Bill, in relation to determining questions of fact, and it logically follows that they should be excluded from the jurisdiction of the Land Court too, although that would not have any effect on its jurisdiction on any question of law.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In line 40, after second "of", insert "his or".—[The Lord Advocate.]

9.30 p.m.

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 3, line 44, to leave out "the foregoing subsection" and to insert:
the Landholders Acts (in their application to the crofting counties) or the Act of 1955 or this Act".

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it would be convenient to discuss with this Amendment the Amendments to the First Schedule, in page 24, line 26, leave out "subsections" and insert "subsection", and in page 24, leave out lines 35 to 37.

The Lord Advocate: That will be convenient.
The purpose of the Amendment is to ensure that the Register is kept up to date. In order to ensure that, the Land Court must report any relevant decisions to the Commission. The Land Court has a certain jurisdiction under the Landholders Acts and the Act of 1955, as well as under the Bill, which might affect matters in the Register. The object of the Amendment is to ensure that when the court deals with these matters the decision is reported to the Commission in order to enable the necessary amendments to be made. The Amendments to the Schedule are consequential.

Amendment agreed to.

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 4, line 1, to leave out subsection (3).

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think it will be for the convenience of the House to discuss with this Amendment the Amendments to the First Schedule, in page 25, lines 37 and 44.

The Lord Advocate: Yes, that will be convenient.
The object of subsection (3) was to repeal certain provisions of Section 21 of the Act of 1886, which gave the Land Court jurisdiction to deal with things like boundaries and marches between crofters' holdings and certain other matters. It was thought that, in view of the provisions of Clause 4 (1), Section 21 could be repealed. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) raised a question about whether the repeal should in fact be made. I have looked into the matter and I think that it would be better to leave the provisions of the 1886 Act standing so as to make it clear that any questions arising under the Landholders Acts on marches, boundaries, and so on, are to be decided by the Land Court.
Therefore, the Amendment deletes subsection (3), and Section 21 of the Act of 1886 will remain as it stands. The two Amendments to the Schedule are corollaries to this. Their purpose is to ensure that if questions arise under the Landholders Acts they will be taken to the Land Court under Section 25 of the 1911 Act: and not under this Clause. It is merely to ensure that there is no overlapping jurisdiction between the two.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 6.—(ASSESSMENT OF COMPENSATION FOR IMPROVEMENTS.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 5, line 19, to leave out
for use for crofting purposes.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it would be convenient to the House to discuss with this Amendment the Amendment in page 5, leave out lines 21 to 23.

Mr. Leburn: Yes, that will be convenient.
When Clause 6 was discussed in Committee it was suggested by hon. Members opposite that the reference in subsection (2) to "crafting purposes" might be deleted. This Clause contains the new

basis valuing any permanent improvement erected by a crofter on his croft for which he is entitled to claim compensation from his landlord on termination of his tenancy. The words
as a separate croft for use for crofting purposes 
were inserted in the Bill by Amendmen, for clarification.
I promised, however, to consider the suggestions made by hon. Members opposite when the Amendment to delete the words "for use for crofting purposes" was discussed, together with the related definition of "crofting purposes". We have reconsidered the matter and have reached the conclusion that the words in question and the definition are superfluous, and these two Amendments were accordingly put down to delete them.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 5, leave out lines 21 to 23.—[Mr. Leburn.]

Clause 7.—(AMENDMENT OF PROVISIONS OF ACT OF 1955 RELATING TO RIGHT OF DISPOSSESSED ABSENTEE CROFTER TO ACQUIRE DWELLING-HOUSE.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 6, line 28, at the beginning, to insert:
(1) Subsection (1) of section seventeen of the Act of 1955 (which relates to absentee crofters and treats as an absentee crofter a crofter who is not ordinarily resident on, or within two miles of, his croft) shall have effect as if for the words "two miles" there were substituted the words "ten miles".

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it will be convenient to take with this Amendment the Amendments in page 6, line 29, and page 7, line 1.

Mr. Leburn: Yes, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. These are three drafting Amendments, to secure greater clarification.

Mr. Manuel: Although we have not got as far as we wished with this Amendment we have advanced a considerable way towards bringing some reality into the question of absentee crofters. The two-mile provision was ludicrous, and the substitution of a ten-mile limit brings the matter into far better focus, because it is now not nearly so arduous a matter to travel long distances in the Highlands, thanks to propulsion by means of the internal combustion engine. The new provision should be welcomed by all Members.

Mr. Willis: We do riot mind galloping through the Bill at considerable speed, but we cannot gallop at the expense of clarity and accuracy on the part of the Minister. This is rather more than a drafting Amendment. I know there was a time when Ministers merely nodded their heads and said, "drafting", or "consequential", and gat all sorts of things through the House, but now that we have a vigilant Opposition we cannot allow those malpractices. I am surprised that the Minister should be indulging in an action of this kind. The Amendment extends the distance at which a crofter may reside from his croft. That is an important change.

Mr. Leburn: In fact, it does not. We are dropping subsection (3) and putting the provision at the beginning of the Clause instead of at the end.

Mr. Willis: But it deals with an alteration from two miles to ten. I do not know whether we are discussing subsection (3). If the hon. Member had said that this was a tidying-up Amendment it would have been all right. I hope that he will treat us to a little more information in future.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In page 6, line 29, leave out from "under" to "such" in line 30 and insert "the said subsection (1)".

In page 7, line 1, leave out subsection (3).—[Mr. Leburn]

Clause 8.—(REORGANISATION SCHEMES.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 7, to leave out lines 39 to 41 and to insert:
(b) if he so wishes, be of a value not less.
The Taylor Commission, when dealing with reorganisation schemes, stated in paragraph 141 on page 45 of its Report that a reorganisation scheme
should give to every bona fide crofter resident within the township and able and willing to cultivate the soil at least a fair equivalent to the holding which he originally had.
This recommendation was written into the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1955, which provided that under a reorganisation scheme no crofter ordinarily resident in the township who was able and willing to cultivate a croft should be provided under the scheme with a croft of less value than his original croft.
In the Bill we sought to make it clear that the crofter's ability to cultivate in this context should not be judged in relation to his personal ability, but should take account of the fact that in accordance with the statutory conditions a crofter may cultivate the croft by himself or with his family with or without hired labour.
In the Standing Committee the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Rankin) moved an Amendment to delete "and able" from Clause 8 (2), and I undertook to reconsider the whole matter. I have done so. I have given careful thought to this question, and have come to the conclusion that the important thing about a reorganisation scheme is to ensure that the land in the township is reallocated among the crofters in a sensible way.
The Amendment has, therefore, been tabled to ensure that each crofter involved in a reorganisation scheme shall, if he wishes, receive under the scheme a croft of not less value than his original croft. Clause 8 (2) also provides that the new croft shall, if the crafter wishes, include his existing dwelling-house.

Mr. T. Fraser: On behalf of my hon. Friends and myself, I thank the Joint Under-Secretary of State for the Amendment. We had a considerable discussion in the Standing Committee about the words "willing and able". We appreciate that "willing" meant that the crofter was just willing to have a croft, but we doubted very much the ability of any authority to decide the ability of the crofter to cultivate the crop. Therefore, we did not think that "and able" had any real meaning. At least, we thought that those words would be completely inoperable in the administration of the Clause.
In the circumstances, we were grateful to the Joint Under-Secretary for moving the Amendment in fulfilment of a promise which he made to see how best be could get rid of the words "and able".

Amendment agreed to.

9.45 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 9, line 5, to leave out "two" and insert "four".

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it would be convenient to take with this Amendment that in page 9, line 13.

Mr. Leburn: In Standing Committee we had a very long but, I think, helpful discussion about what was a reasonable length of time within which a crofter could be expected to say whether or not he favoured a draft reorganisation scheme. The major factor in this consideration was the possibility that some of the crofters involved in any scheme might be employed in jobs which necessitated some period of absence from their crofts. Hon. Members gave various examples of this—such as a crofter being away fishing.
What we have tried to do is to devise a reasonably expeditious procedure, on the one hand, but, at the same time, to give a reasonable time to the crofter, on the other. The extension of the voting period from two to four months as contained in the Amendment effectively achieves a fair balance between these two considerations.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 9, line 13. leave out "two" and insert "four".—[Mr. Leburn.]

Clause 9.—(PUTTING INTO EFFECT OF REORGANISATION SCHEMES.)

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 9, line 41, to leave out "or the last foregoing section" and to insert "Act".
This is a drafting Amendment, but, to respond to the wishes of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis), perhaps I had better say a few words about it.
Clause 9 (2) enables the Commission to appoint different dates on which different provisions of a reorganisation scheme shall come into effect. It is envisaged that it may be necessary for such a scheme to be put into effect in phases, particularly if the bringing in of land for the enlargement of crofts is involved.
Clause 9 (2) states that for the purposes of Clauses 8 and 9 the effective date of a reorganisation scheme in relation to any land shall be the date fixed by the Commission—

the date on which the provisions of that scheme which apply to such land are put into effect.
There is, however, reference to the date on which a reorganisation scheme is put into effect elsewhere in the Bill apart from Clauses 8 and 9—for example, in Clause 2 (3). It is, therefore, necessary that the reference in Clause 9 (2) to the effective date of a reorganisation scheme should apply to all the provisions of the Bill and not simply to Clauses 8 and 9. This is the change achieved by the Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 10, line 28, to leave out from crofter "to the end of the subsection and to insert:
for a period of seven years from the term at which it first became payable".
The Bill provides that when a crofting township is reorganised under Clauses 8 and 9 the existing rental of the township shall be reallocated by the Land Court between the reorganised crofts. When this aspect of township reorganisation was discussed in Standing Committee we had a considerable debate and a useful exchange of views. Hon. Members on both sides of the Committee were of opinion that it would be an advantage if, following a reorganisation scheme, there should be a fixed period during which the rents of the crofts should remain stable. The purpose of this Amendment is to provide such a period of stability lasting for seven years unless both the landlord and crofter agree otherwise.
I do not think I need say more about it. The over-ruling interest is to encourage crofters to take part in a reorganisation scheme and one of the things which might discourage them in this matter would be if they had not known that their rent would be fixed for some period of years. One might argue whether it ought to be ten or five years, but on balance seven years was chosen as being the period which at the moment is the time which must elapse from one period of rent revision to another. The period of seven years seems reasonable, as I hope the House will agree.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 12.—(SPECIAL PROVISIONS REGARDING SUBLETTING OF CROFTS NOT ADEQUATELY USED.)

Mr. Maclay: I beg to move, in page 14, line 6, to leave out from "a" to the end of the subsection and to insert:
preliminary notice setting out their opinion as aforesaid and stating that, unless he satisfies them within one year from the date of the service of such preliminary notice that he is making adequate use of his croft, the Commission may, in accordance with the provisions of the next following subsection, serve on him a notice of requirement to sublet.
The Commission may at any time withdraw a preliminary notice served by them on a crofter under this subsection.
(2) Where a crofter on whom a preliminary notice has been served under the foregoing subsection fails to satisfy the Commission within the period mentioned in that subsection that he is making adequate use of his croft, the Commission may, within one month from the expiry of that period, serve on such crofter a notice stating that, subject to the provisions of the next following subsection, the croft will, on the expiry of one month from the date of the service of the notice or such longer period as may be specified in the notice, become subject to a requirement that it be sublet".
Perhaps it would be of convenience to the House if we discussed with this Amendment the Amendments in lines 10, 11 and 18.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Yes, I think that that would be convenient.

Mr. Maclay: There was very considerable discussion in Standing Committee on the provisions of this Clause which deals with the Commission's power, in the last resort, to arrange for the sublet of a croft which has not been adequately used. As my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary explained, it has been one of our main considerations in framing this Clause that there should be full consultation and negotiation with the crofter in the first place. We have been in no doubt that in approaching these cases the Commission would inevitably consult with the crofter to advise, persuade and help him to bring his croft into adequate use; and only if these informal efforts failed would the Commission set in motion the formal procedure with a notice that the croft would become subject to requirement to sublet.
In these circumstances it seemed on balance preferable not to circumscribe the Commission in the time devoted to such preliminary consultations and

advice. In some cases it might spend a great deal of time, feeling that the crofter would in fact improve his use of the croft; in others where there was flagrant neglect and the crofter was clearly unable or unwilling to bring his croft into adequate use the Commission would come to the issue of a notice more quickly. On the other hand, it can be argued that it would help both the Commission and the crofter if there were provision in the Statute requiring preliminary notice of inadequate use to be given by the Commission and allowing the crofter a reasonable period in which to satisfy the Commission that he was now making adequate use of his croft.
In the light of the discussion in Standing Committee, my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary concluded and it was agreed that it would meet the general wishes of the Committee to provide for a year's preliminary notice. The first of these Amendments in page 14, line 6, makes that provision. The Amendment also implements a further undertaking made by my hon. Friend when the matter was being discussed in Standing Committee. It enables the Commission to withdraw a preliminary notice at any time. This is only reasonable, since the crofter may well satisfy the Commission as to his use of the croft long before the expiry of the year's preliminary notice.
The Amendment finally deals with a point, which was raised in Standing Committee, concerning the notice issued by the Commission to a crofter who after the year's preliminary notice still fails to satisfy the Commission that he making adequate use of his croft. It was felt that the period of one month, within which the crofter may refer the question to the Secretary of State, did not take account of the circumstances of particular crofters whose work, as has been pointed out, might take them away from the croft and in whose case delivery of the notice might take some time. My hon. Friend explained that he recognised the difficulty that might arise in particular cases, and to meet this difficulty he undertook to include in the subsection a provision enabling the Commission to specify in the notice a longer period than one month where necessary. This the Amendment does.
The other three Amendments, in lines 10, 11 and 18, are consequential on the


first Amendment. Two of them, those in lines 10 and 18, are necessary due to a renumbering of the subsection. The third allows the crofter the same length of time to refer to the Secretary of State the question of whether he is making adequate use of his croft as is provided in the notice telling him when the croft will become subject to a requirement that it be sublet. This would be a month in the normal case, or such longer period as the notice may specify to meet any particular difficulty in the individual case. I hope that with that explanation the Committee will feel that these Amendments provide what is desired by hon. Members.

Mr. T. Fraser: There is no doubt at all that these Amendments make a considerable improvement to the Bill and particularly to this Clause. But also there can be no doubt that the Clause will remain most objectionable even after being amended. The Amendments provide in crofter agriculture the kind of powers which existed for the whole of agriculture for a great many years until they were discontinued by the 1958 Act. No requirement is put on the occupier of any other agricultural land in this country to make adequate use of his land. We require the taxpayer to find about £270 million of subsidy for agriculture generally. Yet about three years ago, at the invitation of the Government and against the wishes of the Opposition, Parliament discontinued the power requiring the adequate use to be made of agricultural land.
Here, we are dealing with the least attractive land in the whole of the United Kingdom, this bogland cultivated by crofters in the seven crofting counties. No one will deny that it is the poorest agricultural land in the United Kingdom, and that they are the poorest husband-men in material terms that one could find anywhere in the United Kingdom. Yet they are the people selected by the Secretary of State on whom to place a requirement that they shall continue to make adequate use of the land of which they have the tenancy occupation.
It is true that, as originally drawn, the Clause did not provide for any warning or for what is now called a preliminary notice. It just gave dictatorial powers to the Commission to decide that a crofter was not making adequate use of

his land and then, almost willy-nilly, the Commission could sublet the land. We pleaded that the Clause should be withdrawn. We voted against it in Committee, notwithstanding the improvement which had been made and the undertaking that it would be amended in the way in which it will be by the acceptance of these Amendments.
The Amendment which has been moved does not worsen the Clause but greatly improves it. However, the Clause will be objectionable even after it has been improved, because it puts a requirement on the crofter adequately to cultivate his land. No such requirement is put on the wealthiest farmers in the country who receive more public money than the crofters. Indeed, some of them receive more money than is paid to all the crofters put together.

Mr. Grimond: This Amendment improves the Clause. As I have said several times, in future crofters will need to be lawyers. After reading this they will also need to be expert mathematicians. I am not sure that I have got the mathematics right, but there is a preliminary notice—a warning—

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Proceedings on Government Business exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the Provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. Maclay.]

Question again proposed, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Grimond: After the year is up at any time within one month the Commission may serve a notice, that is, the definite notice that it is requiring the croft to be sublet. Then, as I understand, the crofter has a month during which he may appeal to the Secretary of State. However, the Secretary of State appears to be at large; there is no time limit, so far as I can see, within which he has to consider any appeal. If there is no appeal then there is another month, and after that there is a notice that within one month the crofter has to sublet the croft.
I am not quite sure whether this comes, in all, to one year and three months, or one year and four months, or one year and five months. I hope that whoever will reply to the debate will


make that crystal clear. I should also like it to be confirmed that there is no time limit on the time which the Secretary of State may have for consideration on appeal.

Mr. Leburn: I shall try to help the hon. Gentleman the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond). I am rather surprised that he does not know the answers already, because we went over and over this in Standing Committee. Perhaps it was on a day—probably it was the only day of the whole 23 sittings of the Committee—that he was not with us.
We have a preliminary notice of one year, and after that, if the notice is not withdrawn, or the Commission is not satisfied that the crofter is making adequate use of his land, then it can serve a notice on him that he may be required to sublet, and then he is given one month in which he has to make up his mind whether or not he is going to appeal to the Secretary of State, and that month is the same month—

Mr. Grimond: Surely not.

Mr. Lebum: I am sorry, but it is exactly the same month:
Where a notice is served under subsection (2) of this section on a crofter by the Commission and either no reference is made … by the crofter or on such a reference the Secretary of State confirms the notice, the Commission may, within one month from the last date on which a reference might have been made … or from the date on which the notice was confirmed …as the case may be, serve on the crofter a further notice …

Mr. Grimond: May I assist the Under-Secretary of State? I begin to think that neither of us was there on that day of the Committee. Surely, when the year is up, according to the Amendment, the Commission has a month. It may allow, presumably, 30 days to go by before it serves notice on the crofter, a month during which he has a right to appeal, and the right begins to run from the date the Commission serves the notice. It surely cannot be the same month.

Mr. Leburn: That is not my understanding.

Mr. Grimond: It says a month.

Mr. Leburn: That one month is the same month, and if the crofter has not

taken his opportunity of appealing to the Secretary of State, then he is required to find a sub-tenant. In the new Amendment we are giving the crofter three months during which he may find his sub-tenant. It is only at the end of that time that the Commission can take a decision to sublet compulsorily.

Mr. Thomas Steele: I am certainly new to this problem, not having had the benefit of being on the Standing Committee, but I must confess that, after hearing this discussion tonight, I am more confused than ever. As I understand, one year elapses. I do not say twelve months, so as not to bring the House into even more confusion. One year elapses. At the end of that year what time has the Commission before it serves a notice? Can it wait for a month, two months, or three months? Or does it serve a notice within a month?
As I understand, the Joint Under-Secretary is saying, in effect, that on the date the notice is received, a month runs from that date, which is the month in which the crofter has to make his appeal. It is the same month in that regard. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) wants to know what time then elapses for the Secretary of State for Scotland to make up his mind after he receives the appeal, and whether the time is unlimited at that point. The Secretary of State might be very busy and the other crofter sent to see the Secretary of State might be busy and, therefore, six months might elapse before the decision is taken.
If the Secretary of State refuses the appeal, is it then that the crofter has three months to enable him to get a sublet before the Commission takes action?

Mr. Leburn: With the permission of the House, I shall try to get this right. I agree that it is very confusing and that the more one goes over it the more confused one is inclined to get. We have a preliminary notice of a year. That, I think, is not in dispute. At the end of that time, the Commission may, within one month from the expiry of that period, serve on the crofter a notice stating that subject to the provision the croft will, on the expiry of one month from the date of the service of that notice, become subject to a requirement. The first month there


is so that the threat, so to speak, is not hanging over the crofter's head for an indefinite period and, therefore, the Commission must decide whether the axe is to come down, and whether it should take action, and the Commission has only a month in which to do that.
From the period of the service of that notice, the crofter has a month in which to make up his mind whether or not he will appeal to the Secretary of State. Assuming that he appeals to the Secretary of State, then, as the hon. Gentleman surmises, the Secretary of State can take as long as he wishes to make up his mind. But once the Secretary of State has done so and has come down not in favour of the crofter, but against the crofter, so to speak, and the crofter comes under an obligation to sublet his croft, he then has three months in which to find his sub-tenant, I am grateful to the hon. Member for Dunbartonshire, West (Mr. Steele) for doing a bit of arithmetic while all this has been going on, because I cannot quite make up my mind how far we have got in months and days.

Mr. Willis: The answer to the hon. Gentleman is that it all depends on how long the Secretary of State takes to make his decision. If he attends to this matter with his customary speed and diligence, I have no doubt it will be about two and a half years that the right hon. Gentleman will have to consider this matter. I agree with the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) that this should be put in clear form. Would it not be possible to put a Schedule at the end of the Bill with a small table showing the twelve months' preliminary notice and the other in a month, and so on, so that the crofter can see what time he has? That may not be possible, but it might be a good thing if something like that could be done, because it is very difficult to understand what this Clause means.

Mr. Speaker: I do not want unduly to restrict the debate, but the difficulty is that if we draft other Amendments we shall be out of order. We have to discuss the Amendment on the Notice Paper and not another one.

Mr. Willis: I am grateful for your guidance, Mr. Speaker, but we are discussing this Clause and all I suggest

is that it is exceedingly difficult to understand. This has been proved by the fact that different hon. Members have already asked how long a period this is and what the provisions are. The same thing happened in Standing Committee and the Joint Under-Secretary himself was not quite sure of the answer. I have simply made a suggestion for the hon. Gentleman's consideration when the Bill goes to another place. It might be no good, but on the other hand it might be good.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In line 10, after "the" insert "last".

In line 11, leave out from "may" to "refer" in line 12 and insert:
at any time before his croft becomes subject, in terms of such notice, to a requirement that it he sublet".—[Mr. Leburn.]

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 14, line 15, to leave out from "and" to "may" in line 16 and to insert:
if the crofter does not object to such consultation, after consulting with any grazings committee appointed under section twenty-four of the Act of 1955 in respect of common grazings in the township in which the croft is situated".
The subsection which it is proposed should be amended by this Amendment deals with the situation arising When the crofter has been served by the Commission with a notice that his croft may be subject to the requirement that it be sublet and has referred the matter to the Secretary of State. As drafted, subsection (2) provides that before deciding whether to annul or confirm such a notice the Secretary of State must offer the crofter an opportunity of making representations to him.
When the matter was considered in Standing Committee, the hon. Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan) put down an Amendment proposing that before reaching his decision on the matter the Secretary of State should invariably consult the township's grazings committee. I indicated then that, while I accepted the idea that such consultation might be useful at this stage, I thought that there might be occasions when the crofter concerned might not wish the grazings committee to be consulted. The crofter might not be persona grata with the committee or might have some other reason for not


wanting to be consulted. I think that the hon. Member for the Western Isles generally agreed with this point of view.
Accordingly, in bringing forward the Amendment we have provided that the Secretary of State shall at this stage consult the grazings committee if the crofter does not object to such consultation.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In line 18, leave out "(1)" and insert "(2)".—[Mr. Leburn.]

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in line 26, to leave out "one month" and to insert "three months".
The Amendment fulfils an undertaking which I gave in Committee. Its effect is to extend the time limit involved in procedure under the Clause where the Commission may require the crofter to sublet his croft. The period in question is the length of time allowed to the crofter to enable him to find a subtenant of his own. In the Bill as drafted a period of one month is allowed to enable him to find a sub-tenant, but I am sure that all hon. Members would agree that it is preferable to allow him three months. When I was doing my arithmetical timetable I anticipated this when I spoke about three months.

Mr. Willis: I suggest that the hon. Gentleman should also consider adding another month to enable the crofters to understand this Clause.

Amendment agreed to.

10.15 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 14, line 41, at end to insert:
and any reference in this or the next following section to proposals submitted to the Commission under subsection (3) of this section and approved by them shall include a reference to conditions imposed by the Commission under this subsection in giving their approval to such proposals".
This Amendment is very nearly a drafting one, proposed for clarification. Clause 12 (5) enables the Commission, when giving approval to proposals submitted by a crofter for subletting a croft, to impose conditions other than any conditions relating to rent. Later in this Clause, and in Clause 13, reference is made to a sublease of a croft granted

by the crofter in accordance with proposals submitted to and approved by the Commission.
When the Bill was in Standing Committee, the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) raised the question of whether the proposals submitted by the crofter and approved by the Commission included any conditions imposed by the Commission. The purpose of the Amendment is to make it clear that the crofter's proposals, when approved by the Commission, shall include any such conditions.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 15, in line 5, to leave out from "shall" to "the" in line 7 and to insert:
consult with any grazings committee appointed under section twenty-four of the Act of 1955 in respect of common grazings in the township in which the croft is situated, and thereafter the Commission shall, if they propose to grant such sublease, serve on the landlord of the croft and on the crofter a notice to that effect which shall also specify".
Clause 12 (7) outlines the procedure to be followed by the Commission when it has reached the stage where it requires the grant of a croft sublease, the crofter himself having failed to respond to the opportunity to arrange a sublease. The purpose is to ensure that, before granting any sublease, whether it includes a right of common grazings or not, the Commission shall consult the grazings committee for the township.
In Standing Committee, hon. Members on both sides stressed the desirability of drawing on the local knowledge possessed by grazings committees, and also the need to strengthen these committees by enabling them to play a full part in the life of the community. The Amendment provides that the township grazings committee will be consulted by the Commission before the Commission notifies a crofter and his landlord of its proposals for subletting a croft.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 15, line 19, at end to insert:
and the Commission shall also make a record of the condition as at the date of entry under the sublease of any fixed equipment let thereunder.
(9) A sublease of a croft granted by the crofter in accordance with proposals submitted to the Commission under subsection (3) of this section and approved by them, or by the


Commission under subsection (6) of this section, shall not, unless the crofter so wishes, include—

(a) any dwelling-house or garden ground forming part of the croft;
(b) any buildings or other structures erected, or any works executed, on the croft which, by virtue of subsection (2) or (3) of section five of this Act, are permanent improvements on the croft;
(c) such part of the croft as the Commission shall determine, being a part which (taken together with the site of any dwelling-house, garden ground, buildings, structures or works which, by virtue of the foregoing provisions of this subsection, are not included in the sublease) extends to one acre;
(d) any right pertaining to the tenancy of the croft to cut or take peat".

Mr. Speaker: I believe that it would be convenient for the House to discuss the remaining Government Amendments to page 15 at the same time.

Mr. Leburn: That is so, Mr. Speaker. The first purpose of the Amendment is to provide that, when the Commission grants a sublease on a croft, it shall make a record of the condition at the date of entry of any fixed equipment included in the sublease. Such a record will be useful when the sublease comes to an end. It will facilitate the determination by the Land Court of any question arising under Clause 12 (12, b) as to whether any sum is payable by the subtenant to the crofter in respect of any deterioration of improvements included in the sublease.
The other purpose of the Amendment is to meet the view, expressed in Standing Committee, that certain subjects should be excluded from any sublease granted under the Clause, unless the crofter were willing that those items, or any of them, should be included. The excluded items are, first, any dwelling-house or garden ground forming part of the croft; secondly, any non-agricultural buildings, structures, or works erected or executed under Clause 5, whether they were erected before or after the commencement of the Bill—those are buildings and structures erected for the purpose of a non-agricultural occupation, a particular interest to the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond)— thirdly, an area of an acre including the site of the croft dwelling-house, garden ground, non-agricultural buildings, or structures, or works, in so far as those are not sublet.
The Amendment also provides, again to meet a suggestion of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, that a sublease granted by the Commission shall not, unless the crofter wishes, include any right to cut peats which goes with the tenancy of the croft.
The other Amendments are consequential and I hope that the House will accept them.

Sir J. Duncan: I have had personal experience of making records and I notice that the Government suggest that the Commission should have a record made of the fixed equipment of the croft. That may not be as expensive a business as it is in the case of an ordinary farm, but it is quite a business and it has to be gone into fairly carefully. In this case, it is only the fixed equipment, but I wonder what that covers.
For instance, with a farm one has to consider the state of the drains, and if possible, have plans of them, and report what the state of the fencing is, and so on. This can be very detailed. It is rather boring for the man who has to do it, but it is quite expensive for the landlord who has to pay for it. If the Commission is to do this work thoroughly, it might have to pay a considerable sum. I am not suggesting any alteration and nor do I oppose the suggestion, but when the Bill goes to another place I hope that the Secretary of State will consider whether the matter can be cleared up in the interests of the taxpayer who will have to pay for the work which the Commission does in the interests of the crofter at the end of the sublease, if he has to pay compensation for improvements, or of the sub-tenant if he has to pay compensation for not looking after the drains, for instance, during his sub-tenancy.

Mr. Grimond: I sympathise with what the hon. Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan) has said. It is one of the difficulties of the Bill that we make it more and more complicated until we begin to wonder whether there will be any time left for crofting when the crofter has dealt with all these provisions. We cannot go over the ground again, and the purpose which the Government have in mind is reasonable if it can be carried out as simply as possible.
I thank the Government for having incorporated my Amendments as well as those of other hon. Members. Are they


satisfied that access to the house and buildings and peat rights will be covered? I think that it is, but I should like the Under-Secretary to make sure.

Mr. Manuel: I commend the Amendments. The Government ought to be grateful to the Opposition for the changes now being made. Under the original Clause, when a croft was sublet the whole of it, other than any garden ground, would have been taken over. Those of us who know the Highlands and the crofting areas know how small those gardens can be. They are often merely a yard strip round the house. Under the original proposals, a garage, or some other building used for some ancillary employment, would automatically have been transferred to the sub-tenant.
Now we are to have an acre not just surrounding the house, but in whatever direction may be most suitable to encompass the buildings which the crofter wishes to retain. Although we first suggested two acres, I am grateful that one acre is being allowed. This will be very much appreciated if these conditions of sub-tenancy are to apply.

Mr. T. Fraser: I think that we are here dealing also with a croft which is compulsorily sublet by the Commission. That is the croft about which we were mostly concerned in Committee upstairs.
The hon. Gentleman has met most of the points put forward by hon. Members on this side of the House, including the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond), about the safeguards which were required for the person who was to be left in the dwelling-house, with the one exception that no provision is made for him having access to the house.
There is no provision that after the land has been compulsorily sublet to some other person, the crofter who is left with the house and the garden round it and the buildings he has put up for the purpose of his ancillary occupation, will have access from the public road to the land and buildings which he occupies.
I am not unduly concerned about that. I think that we will be wasting time to put these provisions into the Statute, because it is my hope, which, I think, is shared by the hon. Gentleman, that Clause 12 will never be operative.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In page 15, line 25, leave out subsection (10).

In line 31, leave out from "croft" to "be" in line 33 and insert:
or of a whole croft other than any subjects which, by virtue of subsection (9) of this section, are not included in the sublease".

In line 35, leave out from "in" to "be" in line 36 and insert "any other case".—[Mr. Leburn.]

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 16, line 3, after "subsection", to insert:
and of subsection (3) of the next following section".

Mr. Speaker: I think that it would be convenient to discuss with that Amendment the Amendment to Clause 13, in page 17, line 38.

The Lord Advocate: Yes, Mr. Speaker. That would be convenient.
This is a paving Amendment for the Amendment in page 17, line 38. The question was raised during the Committee stage of the Bill of the effect of the termination of a crofter's tenancy on a sublease into which he had entered. The law is not entirely clear on that, and there is no provision dealing with it either in the 1955 Act or in this Bill. Accordingly, we propose to put this in now to get a little clarification.
The Amendment provides that all subleases shall terminate when the principal lease finishes, subject, however, to an important proviso which gives the subtenant the right to apply to the Commission for a period of grace of up to one year. It further provides that the landlord must not take any action to remove him during the first month after the principal tenancy expires, or if he has made an application to the Commission before the date when the Commission decides upon that application.

Amendment agreed to.

10.30 p.m.

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 16, line 4, to leave out "seven" and to insert "five".
The purpose of the Amendment is to reduce from seven years to five years the maximum duration of any croft sublease granted by the Commission under Clause 12. The Amendment fulfils a promise made in Committee. Perhaps


I should stress that the period of five years proposed is a maximum period and that the duration of a sublease may be for a lesser number of years, depending on the circumstances of the case. When considering how long such a period should be, one has to bear in mind the interests of both the crofter and the sub-tenant. I think hon. Members will agree that it is necessary that the subtenant should have a reasonable period to enable him to plan ahead. However, on reconsideration, bearing in mind that the Commission in its 1959 Report mentioned a period of five years, it was felt that a maximum of five years instead of seven years would be sufficient for this purpose.

Amendment agreed to.

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 16, line 9, to leave out:
in a proper state of repair".

Mr. Speaker: It is convenient to discuss with this Amendment the Amendment in page 16, line 11.

The Lord Advocate: Yes, Mr. Speaker. The two Amendments go together. They arise out of an Amendment which was made in Committee and an undertaking given by my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary. The phrase "fair wear and tear excepted" was deleted from the Bill in Committee, but my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary pointed out that in the Bill as it stood after that Amendment had been made the obligation on the sub-tenant could be read as meaning that he would have to put the permanent improvements in a better state of repair than when he took them over. The two Amendments are designed to remedy that, by deleting
in a proper state of repair
and inserting
in as good a state of repair as they were in
when he took over.

Mr. T. Fraser: What sense is there in the Amendment in page 16, line 11? Why are we putting words in? The subtenant is now under the obligation to keep the permament improvements in as good a state of repair as they were in at the date on which he took over the tenancy. I can understand what is meant by "a proper state of repair", but who is to say five years afterwards whether

the state of repair of the fencing is as good as it was five years earlier?

Sir J. Duncan: That is the point of the record.

Mr. Fraser: Will the record say how many staples were missing? The Commission will have a busy time going round counting every staple and noticing how many tiles are broken.

Sir J. Duncan: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman does not appreciate what he did in the 1948 Act. It is a very detailed and meticulouss system of recording whether any wire in any part of a fence is loose or whether any stakes are missing, etc.

Mr. Fraser: The hon. Gentleman does not appreciate what is being done in the Bill. We are dealing with crofts which are as small as two acres or as large as seventy acres. It is dealing with crofts in the most sparsely populated parts of the country. The Bill gives power to the Commission compulsorily to take croft land from the crofter for a period not exceeding five years. A record will be made of everything on this croft and then, when the sub-tenant hands back the croft at the end of five years, or whatever shorter period it may be—and it may be a longer period, because there may be two periods of subletting—he must be able to satisfy the crofter and the Commission that the fixed equipment is in as good a state of repair as it was at the time when he took the sub-tenancy.
We can determine without great difficulty whether the fixed equipment is in a proper state of repair, but it will cause difficulties—and it is likely to lead to considerable litigation—if we put in these words. As a matter of fact, I think that the hon. Member for South Angus (Sir J. Duncan) will look in vain through the 1948 Act, for the words to which I am now taking objection. If the Lord Advocate can tell me that these words are in the 1948 Act, I shall look at it with interest, and then inquire whether it has proved possible to make sense of them in the administration of the Act.

Mr. Manuel: There is a little difficulty here. We are presupposing that the sub-tenant coming in will get equipment either in a proper state of repair or, as the provision will be amended, in as good a state of repair as it was in when he took over. Some of the fixed equipment, such


as the drains, could be in a bad state of repair at that date. That possibility should be guarded against. We cannot cover the possibility of the existence of a state of disrepair by saying that premises are in a good state of repair. Perhaps the Lord Advocate will tell me that this is possible, but I think we ought to safeguard both the crofter and the subtenant from this sort of contingency which may arise at the end of a sub-tenancy.

The Lord Advocate: If I may speak again, with the leave of the House, I would agree with hon. Members opposite that after five years have elapsed it is not always easy to say in precise and detailed terms whether any post or staple is in as good a state of repair as it was in five years earlier. But we are in a slight dilemma here, because unless we have something on these lines we are putting an obligation on the sub-tenant not merely to keep the fixed equipment up but to improve it. Indeed, if we left in the words
in a proper state of repair
it could be read as meaning that if he got it in a bad state of repair he would have to bring it up to a good state of repair. It is to safeguard him against that, that the second Amendment has been put down.

Mr. William Ross: Surely the existence of the words "due to his failure" cancels out the remarks of the Lord Advocate. Let us suppose that the fixed equipment is new when the man enters. How can he possibly be held responsible for any deterioration, when that deterioration is due purely and simply to the passage of time? This matter requiries a little more close examination, and I ask the Lord Advocate to think about it again. It is a difficult job to arrive at a proper balance between the tenant and the sub-tenant, but the Lord Advocate is not proceeding in the proper way by using these words. I apologise for butting in at this stage, after I have been silent during all these proceedings.

The Lord Advocate: If I may speak again by leave of the House, I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for his unusual behaviour. I would point out that during the Committee stage hon. Members opposite wanted to take out the words
fair wear and tear excepted",

and that was the decision of the Committee at that time.

Mr. T. Fraser: Before the right hon. and learned Gentleman sits down—

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman should seek the permission of the House to speak again.

Mr. Fraser: —we thought that the words then in the Bill were very difficult. Would it not have been desirable to put in words requiring something to be done to keep the equipment in a reasonable state of repair or—

Mr. Speaker: It might be, but it would be out of order on this Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 16, line 11, after "sublease", insert "in as good a state of repair as they were in at the said date".—[The Lord Advocate.]

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 16, line 38, to leave out "earlier" and to insert "later".
Clause 12 (13) provides for the termination of subleases on crofts granted by the Commission under the Clause. There are two circumstances for which the subsection caters: first, where the sub-tenant has broken one or more of the conditions of the sublease, and, second, where the circumstances of either of the parties change so materially that the Commission considers that the sublease should be terminated.
As the Bill is drafted, in both cases the sub-tenant would be permitted to occupy a croft for a period of not less than one year from the date of service by the Commission of the notice terminating his tenancy. When the subsection was discussed in Standing Committee hon. Members suggested that a period of a year was too long, particularly when the sublease was being brought to an end due to a breach by the sub-tenant of the conditions of let. On the other hand, in the case where the reason for the termination of the sublease is a change in the circumstances of one of the parties, I think it was generally agreed that a period of up to one year might not be unreasonable.
Accordingly, the Amendment has been tabled to change the period of one year from being the minimum period to being the maximum period. This will enable


the Commission to specify a period up to a year to suit the particular circumstances. If it is a case of a breach of conditions, one or two months might suffice, while where the circumstances of parties change, a period of up to ten months or a year might be more appropriate.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 13.—(MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS REGARDING SUBLEASES OF CROFTS.)

Amendment made: In page 17, line 39, at end insert:
(3) Where the tenancy of a croft is terminated, any sublease of that croft subsisting immediately before the date of such termination shall come to an end on that date:
Provided that where a sublease comes to an end by virtue of the foregoing provisions of this subsection the Commission may, on an application in that behalf made to them by the subtenant within one month from the date on which the sublease came to an end as aforesaid, make an order permitting the subtenant to remain in occupation of the croft for such period, not exceeding one year from the said date, and subject to such conditions, as may be specified in the order; and no proceedings for the removal of the subtenant from the croft shall be taken by the owner of the croft before the expiry of the said period of one month or, if an application is made under this subsection to the Commission by the subtenant within that period, before the date of the determination of the Commission on such application.—[The Lord Advocate.]

Clause 18.—(AMENDMENTS AND REPEALS.)

Amendment made: In page 20, line 4, leave out "five" and to insert "six".— [Mr. Leburn.]

First Schedule.—(AMENDMENTS OF THE ACT OF 1955.)

The Lord Advocate: I beg to move, in page 23, line 35, after "croft)", to insert:

(a) in paragraph (c) of subsection (1) for the word "is" there shall be substituted the words "was before the commencement of the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1961"; and
(b).

This is a drafting Amendment. Paragraph (c) of the subsection (1) which is referred to provides that a holding which is constituted a croft by rules under Section 4 of the 1955 Act shall be a croft. The use of the word "is" tends to leave it doubtful whether holdings which were registered under Section 4 before the Bill comes into operation would remain crofts thereafter. This Amendment merely resolves that doubt.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In page 24, line 26, leave out "subsections" and insert "subsection".

In page 24, leave out lines 35 to 37.

In page 25, line 37, at end insert:
17. In section thirty-four (which relates to the determination of disputes), in subsection (1) for the words "are required by or" there shall be substituted the words, "have jurisdiction".

In line 44, at end insert:
18. In section thirty-eight (which provides amongst other things for the modification of enactments in relation to the crofting counties), in subsection (2) after the word "than" there shall be inserted the words "section twenty-five of the Act of 1911 and".—[Mr. Maclay.]

Third Schedule.—(PROVISIONS OF THE ACT OF 1955 REPEALED.)

10.45 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: I beg to move, in page 28, line 17, at the end to insert:
Section thirty-seven … …Subsection (2).
This Amendment repeals subsection (2) of Section 37 of the 1955 Act. That subsection defines for the purposes of the reorganisation provisions of the 1955 Act the words
ordinarily resident in a township".
Since the reorganisation provisions of the 1955 Act are being repealed by this Bill it follows that Section 37 (2) of that Act should also be repealed.

Amendment agreed to.

Order for Third Reading read.—[Queen's Consent, on behalf of the Crown, signified.]

10.47 p.m.

Mr. Maclay: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I wish to express my great thanks to my right hon. and learned Friend the Lord Advocate and to my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State for the meticulous and detailed work which has gone into the Bill, and, of course, I express my appreciation to all those hon. Members who, in Committee, showed a positively surprising enthuasiasm for the Bill.
The Bill started with very good intentions. It is not a very big Measure, but it does some very useful things for a community in which we are intensely interested. The Bill was better when it left the Committee and I thank hon. Members for all that they have done.

10.48 p.m.

Mr. T. Fraser: We now come to the end of the road on this little, non-controversial Bill, which occupied us far quite a considerable time in Committee upstairs. We have spent months on this Measure trying to make something decent of it. I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House who take any interest at all in these matters would recognise that we have improved it slightly, though not through any assistance given by hon. Members opposite who represent crofting constituencies and whose contribution during the Committee stage was very small indeed. They have not even troubled to attend in the House today during the Report stage and now for the Third Reading of the Bill. I think that that fact should be noted. No Highland Tory has even graced the proceedings by his presence.

Mr. George Brown: Is "graced" the right word?

Mr. Fraser: Yes, I think that it is a better word to use than "disgraced", which is not very dissimilar.
It has been claimed by the Government that the Bill will be welcomed by the crofters. It will go unnoticed by the vast majority of the crofters. When I

point out that there are only about 6,000 practising crofters it will be recognised that if the Bill is not even to be noticed by the vast majority of them it will have an effect on only a very small number of our fellow citizens.
It will affect a few smallholders who, because the Secretary of State has taken power to make grants to smallholders in like circumstances to crofters, will receive slightly more generous grants than they are now receiving as agricultural holders, but only slightly more generous. There is very little money in this, but it is a great convenience to the Secretary of State to have these grants paid by the Crofters Commission rather than under other auspices. So this will make a slight difference to a small number of smallholders who are not crofters.
It will make a little difference to some crofters who would not get permission from landlords at present to make certain permanent improvements involv-inv ancillary occupations. They are given statutory permission to make those improvements and compensation is safeguarded. The compensation will not necessarily be paid by the landlord who, on the termination on the tenancy, will come into possession of those improvements. In certain circumstances, the improvements will be paid for by the taxpayer, although the taxpayer will never own the improvements. When they cease to be the property of the crofter, they will become the property of the landlord.
There were very objectionable features in Clauses 7 and 11 as the Bill was introduced and in what is now Clause 8, dealing with reorganisation schemes and compulsory subletting. Those provisions which were most objectionable have been considerably modified in the course of the passage of the Bill. There is little in the Bill which justifies any commendation. It is a Bill which pretends to be an addition to the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1955, which put certain responsibilities upon the Crofters Commission under Section 2 to deal with the wider economic and social problems of the whole of the crofting counties.
It is claimed that, somehow or other, the Bill will be of some advantage to the whole of the crofting counties and will make a contribution to the social and economic betterment of the whole


of this area. The truth is that the Bill will make no contribution whatsoever to the social and economic betterment of the crofting counties. It is almost tragic that Parliament should have been required to spend so much time considering such a puny and irrelevant Bill as this.
The best that I can say for it at this time is that it is not likely to do very much harm in the Highlands. The great pity is that we are now passing yet another Bill which will not do any real good.

10.53 p.m.

Mr. Grimond: The Joint Under-Secretary must feel, after that speech, that it is a case of "Love's Labour Lost" on the Bill, and a great deal of labour at that, but I must agree that the combined efforts of the Secretary of State, the Joint Under-Secretary and the Lord Advocate have failed to convince me that crofting legislation is other than an intolerable complication. The Bill does not touch the real problems. We have been over that a great many times and I hope that in years to come we can do things a little more simply and, on another occasion, tackle the problems which really concern crofters. I feel that if ever the Bill were implemented on a large scale there would be a great deal of scratching of heads in many lonely parts of Scotland.
There is one point I want to raise with the Government before we part with the Bill. One of the main purposes of the Bill is to encourage subletting of crofts. We are allowing the crofter to retain the croft house and certain other appurtenances of his croft. Presumably, he will go on being called a crofter, and will be a crofter, and will have the crofter's obligations vis-à-vis his landlord, the Commission and the Land Court. There will also be the sub-tenant who will be a crofter in the sense that he is working a croft.
I do not want to go into the matter now, and I do not expect an answer from the Joint Under-Secretary, but the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that certain difficulties can arise. One difficulty which I will give as an example is that a subtenant may ask for a grant for, say, building. The crofter who has sublet the croft may also ask for a grant. I do not know on what principle it is to be de-

cided which of them is entitled to a grant. Perhaps both are entitled. I think that the answer is that both are entitled, but, as I say, one can see that difficulties may arise.
For one thing, on most crofts it will not be very desirable that new structures should be put up, possibly a new croft house, to serve a situation in which the croft is sublet only for a limited period, especially if it is a very small croft. One can imagine that on a small croft of a few acres a sub-tenant might say that he had no house and wanted a grant to put up a house. Then there would be two houses on the croft, yet the subtenancy might be for only five years. I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary will not only look again at the definitions in the Bill, but, also, will consider how it will affect other legislation, particularly that dealing with grants to crofters and crofting.
I should like to thank the Joint Under-Secretary and the other officers of the Scottish Office for their extreme patience and courtesy during the passage of this Bill, and for the trouble they have taken to meet the excellent Amendments which have been moved from this side of the House.

10.57 p.m.

Sir J. Duncan: It would be churlish if someone on this side of the House did not thank my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary for the way in which he has conducted the proceedings on the Bill. He has borne practically the whole weight of it, has been extremely amenable and reasonable, and has worked hard to meet the views which have been expressed from both sides.
I do not consider that this is a great Bill, but it will achieve two things which will help the Crofters Commission to get on with its job; and, certainly, the Commission has a lot to do. First, it deals with reorganisation for which, in certain areas, there are hopeful possibilities, and, secondly, it puts the owner-occupier in an equivalent position with the crofter. If that means that over the years the crofter will tend to buy his own croft and become an owner-occupier, it will be entirely in line with true Tory government.
We have had some headaches in understanding the Bill. The hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) said that there


are 6,000 crofters scattered over the Highlands. Admittedly, some of them are "bush lawyers", but most of them are simple and honest people. They will not understand the Bill either, and I think that the Commission should explain its provisions in simple language in a pamphlet.
One other thing should be done. The Bill should be consolidated eventually with the other Acts which deal with crofting. I do not want to say more, except to congratulate the Government, particularly the Joint Under-Secretary of State, on a good job. It is not a big Bill—no one expects it to be—but it will do some limited good in a limited area.

Mr. W. Ross: The hon. Member has congratulated the Government on keeping to true-blue Tory tradition. Did he do so as a Tory or as a National Liberal?

11.3 p.m.

Mr. Leburn: Before we leave the Bill I would like to say that some hon. Members rather underplayed its importance. We do not claim that it is very important, but it will serve a useful purpose in helping to further development and future prospects of the crofting counties. That will not be achieved by the Bill alone, however. It will require the cooperation of all those who live in these counties and of the crofters themselves.
I thank hon. Members on both sides for the help which they gave me in improving the Bill during its various stages. The hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) regretted the absence of certain hon. Members, particularly on this side. I regret the absence of certain hon. Members on his side, but I shall not go into that. I was greatly encouraged and reinforced by at least one crofting county Member—my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll (Mr. Noble). I regret, also, the absence of the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Rankin), if only because I recall his referring exasperatedly, in Standing Committee, to the continuing search for "words, words, words."
I hope that the 75 hours and half a million words that we have spent on the Bill prove to have been worth while.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

Orders of the Day — EGYPT (COMPENSATION FOR BRITISH SUBJECTS)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. J. E. B. Hill.]

11.4 p.m.

Mr. R. J. Maxwell-Hyslop: I rise to draw to the attention of the House the plight of the British officials who were dismissed by the Egyptian Government in 1951. On 8th December, 1951, as the result of orders given by General Sir George Erskine—the propriety of which I do not question—British forces in the Canal Zone occupied and demolished houses outside the zone in the Egyptian village of Kafr el Abdu.
As a direct result of this event, next day the Egyptian Council of Ministers took the decision peremptorily to dismiss 168 British subjects who were employed by the Egyptian Government. Ninety-six of these officials were, by their contracts of service, guaranteed employment until the age of 60; 15 of them had already devoted more than thirty years of their lives to the service of the people of Egypt; a further 36 had devoted between twenty-five and thirty years' service.
The functions which they fulfilled are worthy of note and sympathy. Of the men, 19 were university professors, five were assistant professors, 45 were university lecturers, five were lecturers in institutes and colleges, 11 were inspectors in the Ministry of Education, 25 were senior schoolmasters and 17 were technical specialists. Of the women, 16 were lecturers in universities and institutes, 18 were school mistresses and senior school mistresses, three were inspectresses at the Ministry of Education, and one was a nurse. That was in December, 1951.
Between then and 1956 they received no compensation whatsoever from either the Egyptian Government which then was, or its successor, the United Arab Republic, nor any form of effective sympathy or support from Her Majesty's Government. In July, 1956, the British Ambassador in Egypt was able to report to the British Government that the Egyptian Minister of Foreign Affairs had expressed the hope that a satisfactory conclusion to the negotiations for


compensation would shortly be agreed and that payments would shortly be forthcoming. However, those negotiations and their execution were overtaken by the events which are commonly described as the "Suez crisis".
In the course of 1956, and until April, 1958, in a certain number of cases minute sums for weekly sustenance were paid out by the Anglo-Egyptian Resettlement Board to support and keep alive a limited number of these unfortunate officials. I regret to say that in terms of public sympathy and effective Government support the claims of these officials, who were dismissed in 1951, have been overshadowed and forgotten because of the claims of those who lost their occupations and their property and their livelihoods in the events of the Suez crisis of 1956. The small weekly payments made by the Resettlement Board to some of the unhappy people were terminated in April, 1958.
In October, 1958, the British Government advanced £100,000, which was distributed among the "1951 claimants" whose total claims amounted to £660,000. Seven months later, Her Majesty's Government received from the Egyptian Government the sum of £100,000 on account, under Article III (f) of the Financial Agreement. That £100,000 was not distributed to the claimants, but was paid back into the Treasury, which had lent £100,000 previously, a Treasury which, I may say, maintains a claim against these unfortunate people and their representatives, the Association of Former British Officials in Egypt, for £5,000 which it advanced to the Association to meet the legal expenses of its lawyers in preparing and substantiating the claims of the 168 officials.
The situation up to April, 1959, was that the Treasury had been reimbursed for the loan which it had made, and from then onwards it paid out nothing in relief and has not even made a loan to these people who by then had been devoid of sustenance, apart from that given in the two years when there were very small weekly dollops and the total of £100,000, less than one-sixth of the claims for the period of eight years.
We have now arrived at 1961, nearly ten years since these people were deprived of their livelihoods. They have

frequently received assurances from Her Majesty's Government that negotiations are proceeding and that a satisfactory conclusion is expected. But such assurances have not enabled them to meet their weekly bills for their everyday needs or to support themselves. All that has happened is that they have been forced to realise all the capital assets they may have had remaining to meet their weekly expenses.
In many cases their capital assets represented investments in British Government securities. This is not surprising, because when people are located in a remote spot, that is, remote from the United Kingdom, they are not able to adjust their investment portfolios to meet current movements in the market. It may have been stupid of them, but it was perhaps not unreasonable to invest in British Government securities, with the result with which all of us are only too unhappily familiar. Nat only have they been forced to consume their capital as income, but they have been forced to sell when the market for British Government securities is grossly depressed.
The £100,000 compensation, less than one-sixth of the total value of their claim, has had to be expended as current income so that even if they receive the remainder of their claim, they will have lost the interest on £560,000 over ten years, and, of course, they have not now the £100,000 to invest as well.
The situation in which they found themselves was that they had to remain in this country and live for two of the eight years on the minute assistance which they received from the Anglo-Egyptian Resettlement Board, for six years on nothing, and, since 1958 presumably, live on the capital which they received out of the £100,000. Some of them, in endeavouring to support themselves, have travelled to the far corners of the globe. One elderly lady, who was one of the 168 dismissed officials, is now supporting herself by working in Iraq.
These people have not thrown themselves on public sympathy. To some extent they have, therefore, been forgotten. They have not formed themselves into a noisy pressure group, and it is, therefore, all the more important that this House should safeguard their interests.
What obligations fall on the British Government? First, as the dismissal of these officials was the direct, and in my submission predictable, result of the actions of British military forces, however justified, in 1951, the British Government have a responsibility to ensure that the full claims of these officials are met. The fact that 22 of them have since died is irrelevant. They have dependants whose claims in equity are no less than if their husbands or wives had still been alive.
It is incumbent on the British Government to ensure that no agreement with the U.A.R. is accepted which does not meet in full the claims of these officials, plus a reasonable interest on the capital from which they should have derived their income for the past ten years.
Secondly, the least that the Treasury can do is to waive the claim to recover the £5,000 it advanced to the Association of Former British Officials in Egypt so that it could pay the lawyers who drew up and substantiated the claims of these unfortunate people.
Finally, the British Government have an obligation not to encourage any British subjects to take up employment with the U.A.R. until the just, legitimate, and substantiated claims of these British officials who were dismissed unilaterally, in breach of their contracts of service, have been fully vindicated. This, I regret to say, is not a purely hypothetical remark.
Earlier this year, advertisements appeared which were sponsored by the British Council, inviting applications from British subjects to serve under the Egyptian Government. The Times, on 6th April last, carried an advertisement —and this also appeared in The Times Educational Supplement—for lecturer-ships in English in the Higher Teachers' College in Heliopolis and two other places. The replies were invited to be sent to the Director of Recruitment, British Council, 65, Davies Street, London, W.1.
I submit that if the British Government lend support to the recruiting of British subjects for employment with the United Arab Republic while the claims of these British citizens dismissed in 1951 remain unsatisfied, then they are betraying their obligations to these officials and are also abdicating from

any future ability to protect the rights of British subjects who may be arbitrarily dismissed in clear breach of contracts of service.
Egypt is a country with which the United Kingdom had a unique relationship; and one not only from history, but also by treaty. That treaty was still in force in 1951 and, therefore, I seek from my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal assurances that the Government will not encourage any British subjects to take up employment in the United Arab Republic while these claims remain unsettled.
I would remind the House that the Export Credits Guarantee Department refused to underwrite credits to some South American republics which have defaulted on claims owing to British firms, on the ground that if it encouraged fresh credits it would be acting to the detriment of the previous creditors. The same analogy applies in the context of which I am speaking. I ask the Lord Privy Seal to persuade the Treasury—and I have given his hon. Friend the Minister of State adequate notice of these proposals to enable him to receive sanction from the Treasury—to say that it agrees that the claims for £5,000 for the solicitors' bill should be waived.
I look forward to hearing from the Lord Privy Seal not further assurances of good will towards these people, but a statement that their claims will be pressed fully by Her Majesty's Government and that, when they are paid, they will be paid not in blocked sterling assets in Egypt, but in available currency and that, in so far as some of the claimants have been forced to seek employment abroad, they will be able to take their compensation and invest it if they so desire in the country where they are now located.
These people have been without effective sustenance for ten years. Others who have been similarly placed since 1956 have received much more generous treatment. In neither case were we at war with the United Arab Republic, but in both cases the hardship suffered has resulted from—I will not say unjustified—but from the premeditated actions authorised by the British Government. These unfortunate people, 22 of whom have since died so that the number now is 146, look to the Government for effective redress.

11.20 p.m.

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Edward Heath): I am very glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop) has had the opportunity of raising this subject tonight. Although it concerns a comparatively small number of people, it is of the greatest importance to each one of them. They certainly have both the interest and the sympathy of every Member of the House, as well as of Her Majesty's Government.
My hon. Friend stated the position with moderation, clarity, and fairness. I thank him for his courtesy in telling my hon. Friend the Minister of State and myself before this evening the points which he wished to raise with us. I assure him of one thing, namely, that these former officials are certainly not forgotten. My noble Friend the Foreign Secretary has himself taken a very close personal interest in this matter since he came to the Foreign Office. I, too, have followed it very closely indeed, during the last eleven months. As my hon. Friend said, provision was made for compensation for these officials in the Financial Agreement which was reached in 1959. Therefore, I hope that he will accept our assurance that they are certainly not forgotten.
My hon. Friend has given the history of the problem. I do not wish to go over that. He has recalled that it arose from the incidents in the Canal Zone in 1951. The first step to deal with it was taken in the Exchange of Notes in 1954, when the Egyptian Government, as they were then, agreed to set up an Egyptian Commission to assess the compensation which should be paid to these officials. The Commission met in 1955 to carry out its business, but no settlement had been reached at the time of the Suez crisis. After this, nothing further could be done until the time when the Financial Agreement was being negotiated.
Under Article III (f) of the Financial Agreement the Government of the United Arab Republic did two things. First, they undertook to pay the United Kingdom Government £100,000 as an interim payment in respect of this compensation. Secondly, they agreed to
cause the Commission to make a final assessment of the compensation due and permit the payment of the balance thereof in sterling.

The point my hon. Friend raised about the means of payment is, therefore, covered in the Agreement. As a result of strong pressure, the Egyptians eventually reconstituted this Commission; but I must tell the House, as I have said at Question Time on several occasions, that we have met with very great difficulty in extracting any final decision from the U.A.R. authorities.
Meanwhile, the officials concerned formed an association in this country, to which my hon. Friend referred, and discussed their problem with a firm of solicitors, which worked out what it thought should be due to the officials by way of compensation. My hon. Friend has indicated that this was quite a considerable sum. It was, in fact, in the region of £660,000. When Her Majesty's Government heard of this figure, in 1958, they decided to advance a total amount of approximately 15 per cent. of the compensation claimed, in the form of loans to the officials concerned. We did not know at that stage what we would be able to obtain from the Egyptians, but the advances made happened to amount to almost £100,000.
When the United Arab Republic Government paid over to Her Majesty's Government the £100,000 provided for in the Agreement, the loans made to the officials by the Government were converted into grants. So the indebtedness of the officials to the Government was cancelled. On 15th August, 1960, our mission in Cairo was told by the chairman that the Commission had formulated the criteria according to which compensation could be calculated. Our mission in Cairo then made repeated representations to the Commission about this. Mr. Crowe, who was then chargé. d'affaires in Cairo, made an appeal, on his farewell visit to Mr. Kaissouni, the United Arab Republic Minister of Economics, on 6th February; but no further information was received by us until the visit of Sir George Rendel to Cairo. He went from the Foreign Office to Cairo to discuss this matter and also various outstanding Egyptian claims. He was then told that the Commission was still working on individual cases.
On 13th March Sir George Rendel saw Hassan Abbas Zaki, Minister of Economics for the Southern Region, who


promised to take the matter up and try to get a speedy settlement. Then, on 26th April, Sir Harold Beeley, our Ambassador, called on Hassan Abbas Zaki and reminded him of his promise to Sir George Rendel. Finally, on 1st June this year, a personal message was sent by my noble Friend the Foreign Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Republic, asking Dr. Fawzi to give this matter his personal attention, so that it might be settled at a very early date.
I have given these details to show my hon. Friend that since the Commission was reconstituted to deal with this matter we have made repeated representations at frequent intervals to members of the U.A.R. Government and to its officials, to reach a speedy settlement.
A number of Questions have been put to me in the House in recent weeks about this matter, and I have on each occasion reported the steps which have been taken, and I have said that I hoped a settlement was very near. I had also hoped to be able to tell my hon. Friend this evening that we had been given information that final decisions had been taken by the U.A.R. 'Government on this matter but, unfortunately, I am not yet able to tell him that.
The present position is that on 21st June—a fortnight ago—the Embassy in Cairo was informed that the Commission had finished its work and that its recommendations were being checked by the Ministry of Finance. But it was also told that in a few days' time, after this process, the report should be ready for consideration by Ministers, and that their decision ought not to be very long delayed. So we are now again hoping that we may receive a decision on this question in the fairly near future. I hope that I have demonstrated to the House that we are most anxious to receive a decision on the final amount of compensation which will be paid by the U.A.R. Government under the Agreement, and that we have made strong and frequent representations to obtain this.
My hon. Friend raised the question of the £5,000 costs which were involved by the members of the officials' association in obtaining a calculation of the compensation due to them. He gave us notice that he would raise this point.

I am quite prepared to consider this matter when we receive information from the U.A.R. Government as to what they are proposing to pay in compensation, and to discuss it with my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I cannot give any decision tonight, or any firm undertaking, but I will tell my hon. Friend that when we get the information from the U.A.R. Government which we are expecting shortly I will again look at the question which he has raised.
The last point that my hon. Friend mentioned was the question of the recruitment of British teachers by the U.A.R. today. This has also been raised on previous occasions in the House by my hon. Friend. When this proposal to assist in the recruitment of British teachers for the U.A.R. was originally considered, we consulted the Chairman and the Secretary of the Association of Former British Officials, to which my hon. Friend referred. We thought it right to discuss this matter with them. After consultation, they both agreed that in all the circumstances we should be justified in going forward with the proposals.
I have listened to the anxiety which my hon. Friend has expressed that this will compromise our position in regard to the claim for compensation for these officials, but I must tell him that, having examined it thoroughly and discussed it with the Chairman and Secretary of the Association, we do not consider that the interests of the 1951 officials would be betrayed by agreeing to co-operate with the Government of the U.A.R. in this matter. We think that it will help to improve relations between this country and the U.A.R., which is a process on which we have been engaged in recent months.
But I would also tell the House that we have pointed out, at the same time, to the Government of the U.A.R. that if this compensation question can be speedily and satisfactorily settled, then the recruitment of these new teachers for which they are asking could be very greatly helped. I hope that the U.A.R. will take this view, and, therefore, not only from the point of view of carrying out the obligations under Article III (f) of the Agreement in respect of compensation, but also from the point of view


of ensuring the supply of teachers which they now require, they will achieve a speedy settlement of this question.
I think that the whole House would agree that we should all like to see an end of this matter and that in trying to achieve better relations between our two countries a speedy settlement by the U.A.R. of this matter would greatly help us and would be of great advantage to both countries.
I hope that my hon. Friend will feel that we have done our utmost for these officials. We have their interests very

much at heart. We know exactly how much it matters to each one of them. As my hon. Friend very properly has said, this has gone on for a very long time, and we are all most anxious that we should have a settlement in the near future. I hope very much that it will now not he long before I can tell the House one day at Question Time that a satisfactory settlement has been reached.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-seven minutes to Twelve o'clock.